Hello everyone, and welcome back to my daily series of Financial Articles about the newest set! We’re about to enter the thick of spoiler season, so it’s time to start talking about the value of cards in Theros! In this article, I’ll be discussing the price of cards using the following time frames:
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 Theros
Future Price – Medium Term: The price I believe this card will be at by the time the next set (Born of the Gods) comes out.
Future Price – Long Term: The price I believe this card will be at a year from now, when the next Fall set is released (Name Unknown!)
There has been a spate of cards added to the spoiler on MTGSalvation.com the past couple of days. I do not want to discuss these cards, because there has been no independent confirmation that the spoilers are accurate. Cards that I do not want to discuss until there is official confirmation: Thassa, Magma Jet, Bow of Nylea, Medomai the Ageless, and Thoughtseize.
The PAX Theros party is this weekend on Saturday. Last year, there were 20+ cards spoiled. Wizards of the Coast put up an article about Return to Ravnica at midnight Saturday to discuss the new cards and the set mechanics. I expect the same from Theros – so tune back in on Monday for a whole slew of new cards to discuss!
Abhorrent Overlord
Starting Price: $1
Current Price: $1
Future Price – Short Term: $0.50
Future Price – Medium Term: $0.50
Future Price – Long Term: $0.50
Thoughts: Bulk Rare. Way to start off this series with a bang!
Anax and Cymede
Starting Price: $4
Current Price: $3
Future Price – Short Term: $2
Future Price – Medium Term: $1.50
Future Price – Long Term: $2
Thoughts: The big question mark is “just how hard will Wizards push Enchantment – Aura” cards in this block? I believe the answer is “very hard”, which will make creatures with Heroic that much better.
Here’s my issue – unless a Rare is an absolute rock-hard tournament staple, it has a hard time breaking the $2 mark in Standard over the long term. Anax and Cymede isn’t going to see much Standard play without a deck that can activate Heroic frequently (most Boros decks want a creature with Haste, or evasion), so the uses of Anax and Cymede are impeded by the thrust of Boros from Return to Ravnica.
Anthousa, Setessan Hero
Starting Price: $1
Current Price: $1
Future Price – Short Term: $0.50
Future Price – Medium Term: $0.50
Future Price – Long Term: $0.75
Thoughts: There were five cards spoiled as the Foil Rares featured for the packaging of the Theros Intro packs. All five of these cards have to battle the price suppression caused by the extra existence of Intro Pack foil Rares entering the market. The issue with Anthousa is that there are better choices for a body at five mana, and it’s going to be potentially difficult to target your own creature, and still have mana left over to attack with three lands.
Ember Swallower
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
Thoughts: I will say that four mana for a 4/5 creature is generally larger than what Red gets at this slot. However, Red isn’t really the color that wants big bruisers without relevant abilities in the beatdown slot. The seven mana ability is a lot to ask to activate, and potentially won’t affect the game too terribly much by that point.
Polukranos, World Eater
Starting Price: $10
Current Price: $10
Future Price – Short Term: $8
Future Price – Medium Term: $6
Future Price – Long Term: $5
Thoughts: Polukranos looks great, but you may be surprised at how I value this Legend. I see three factors working against the price of Polukranos.
The first and most obvious one is that Polukranos is in the Duel Deck that immediately precedes the release of Theros. This will pump a huge quantity of this Mythic into the market that would not have otherwise been available of this card.
The Second factor is that the Monstrosity ability is not actually that great on Polukranos. I had to read and re-read it and it’s not as good as it first looks. I assumed that Polukranos dealt his damage to any number of target creatures, and they dealt their damage back. That is not the case. Polukranos deals his Monstosity X to any number of target creatures, so you’d need to invest seven mana to do three points of damage to your opponent’s creatures. Their creatures, however, do get to deal their full damage in power back to Polukranos.
The third factor working against Polikranos is that if you take out the Monstrosity ability, it’s a 5/5 for four mana in Green, which is commonplace these days.
All in all, I think Polukranos looks really awesome at first glance, but in the end I feel it’s mostly going to function as an overprinted 5/5 creature that takes an echo cost to get to 6/6 or 7/7 the turn after it hits the board.
Shipbreaker Kraken
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
Thoughts: Bulk Rare.
See you all on Monday with a whole lot to discuss!