MTG Lord of the Rings Starter Kit Card Sees 400% Increase!
The One Ring has been found! This occasion is indeed momentous, but it has, once again, thrown the secondary market into turmoil. Collector Booster boxes have dropped and rebounded at a net deficit since The One Ring’s discovery and, while we do not truly know how this is impacting the supply and demand relationship of the set, a lot less Collector Booster product may be getting opened. This shouldn’t affect the secondary market so quickly, but may have a lingering effect in the coming weeks.
For now, however, many Lord of the Rings hidden gems are starting to come to light. As a result, we have a new batch of cards to look out for in the coming weeks!
Forth Eolingas!
Legacy’s newest spice of the month is another Commander card that has some serious competitive implications. After the Initiative cards created an absolute mess of the format, players have been much more aware of what Commander intended mechanics can do to a competitive two-player format.
Forth, Eolingas! is not only a great way to get the Monarch mechanic online in Delver decks, but its also a threat that can create immediate pressure. Thanks to the card scaling as the game continues, this is always a relevant threat, regardless of where it falls on the curve.
This newfound potential has caused Forth, Eolingas! to see a rise in price. Once worth a measly $2.50 in early June, Forth Eolingas! is now retailing for about $12, and is appearing to be purchased in 10+ multiples at this price, suggesting that some players believe this card will continue to become more expensive. For those interested in acquiring one of these cards themselves, you can find it in the Riders of Rohan! Jeskai Commander preconstructed deck.
If you want to read more about Forth Eolingas!, we wrote about it in-depth here.
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Raise the Palisade
Another Lord of the Rings preconstructed Commander card found in the Simic Elven Council EDH preconstructed deck, Raise the Palisade does a Typal-oriented Cyclonic Rift impression. Capable of bouncing all creatures that do not share a creature type of your choice, Raise the Palisade has starting skyrocketing in price after a few MTG personalities pointed out the potential of the card. Basically any Typal deck in blue is probably going to want to run this, as one-sided board wipes have proven to be incredibly powerful in Commander, especially at the rate of a mana value of five.
Raise the Palisade bottomed out at about $2 a few weeks ago. The card is now to about $12 which, ironically, about matches the price this card was going for in prerelease season.
Ringwraiths
We discussed the Ringwraiths’ explosive increase last week, but this seems to have expanded a bit. The extended art versions are still going for what you would expect, but the Jumpstart copy of this card is now also starting to see a price increase.
For a long while, even though other iterations of the Ringwraiths were seeing a price increase, mostly thanks to scarcity, the Jumpstart iteration of this card remained worthless. That has changed this week, however, with Ringwraiths’ basic version seeing an increase from just 28 cents in mid-June to $4-5! This price increase is not universal, with some sales for the card still selling for a low as 60 cents. That said, a majority of sales for the Ringwraiths are now a few bucks at least.
Part of this is simply because the Ringwraiths are a Jumpstart exclusive card. This means you can only find copies of the card in Jumpstart, Set Booster and Collector Booster product. Additionally, the foil and extended art versions of this card still have quite the premium since those cannot be found in Jumpstart packs. The base price for a foil seems to be about $7, but this is showing signs of increasing throughout the week. There are also a series of outlier prices for about $25.
The extended art card only found in collector booster product seems to be selling for between $6 and $7 on average at the moment.
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The One Ring
The serialized One Ring’s discovery may actually end up making the original copies a lot more expensive. As mentioned at the beginning of this article, the discovery of Magic’s most expensive card ever may drastically change the supply and demand relationship for the collector booster products. That may mean less copies of The One Ring are being opened, making it more difficult to address the absolutely absurd demand for this card on the secondary market.
This is the reason that The One Ring saw price increases this week. Every format that can play this card is being completely warped by it. Modern players want four of these. Legacy players want some of these, and Commander players will likely want a copy of this for every single one of their decks. The One Ring is an absolutely unprecedented colorless powerhouse.
This has even caused Magic Online to address the shortage of One Rings by offering win-a-box events every few hours.
In mid-June, according to TCGplayer market averages, copies of The One Ring were only selling for about $26. Prices have exploded since then, with base copies of The One Ring selling for between $60 and $70! The premium copies of this card have a massive multiplier thanks to the incredible demand behind this card. We talked about these premiums more in-depth here.
Witch-King, Bringer of Ruin
The Witch-King, Bringer of Ruin is a good representation for one collection of cards seeing a price increase this week. Thanks to the popularity of the Nazgul, many Commander players seem to have their eyes on building Wraith Typal decks. This seems purely fueled by the collectibility and iconic status of the uncommon Nazgul cards in the main set, but the archetype is definitely powerful. This may also contribute to the price increase of the Ringwraiths.
Even though the Witch-King, Bringer of Ruin isn’t doing anything super interesting, it has still seen a massive price increase – rising from $3 to $15 over the last month. This card is still being bought in absurd multiples – suggesting that this price increase may not be over yet.
Another note with this one – Witch-King, Bringer of Ruin cannot be found in the main set. You can only find this card in the Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth starter kit.
Kiora Bests the Sea God
Tom Bombadil
seems to, once again, be causing Saga cards to rise in price. Kiora Bests the Sea God is definitely one of the strongest saga cards that Magic has to offer. Seven mana is not a cheap price to pay but, should you pay it, this card creates a Hexproof 8/8 that is a nightmare for opponents to deal with, can slow down the biggest threat at the table to allow other players to keep up and, finally, steal whichever permanent you like. With synergies such as Power Conduit, you can keep resetting the third phase of this Saga, gaining control of the most powerful permanent on the board every turn cycle!
Thanks to this card’s obvious synergies with Tom Bombadil, Kiora Bests the Sea God has seen a massive increase in price. Over the past ten days, the saga has risen in price from about $3.75 to $11-13 on average. Foil copies of the card tend to be going for a little bit more.
This is hardly all of the price changes that occurred this week, but it is a good amount of them. Otherwise, a lot of the other price changes that we covered last week have continued to move this week.
Read More: LOTR Cards Break Potentially Problematic Archetype
Source: MTG Rocks
