After a few teasing spoilers and a lot of excitement, Wizards of the Coast has finally revealed its latest deck. Released via Secret Lair, this new Commander deck features gorgeous art, staple reprints, and remarkably compelling value. Supporting one of the most popular archetypes in Commander it’s safe to say that excitement is high for this deck.
To sate this growing excitement, Wizards has now revealed the entire decklist for Raining Cats and Dogs. Set to be released on the 22nd of January at 9 AM PT, this deck has a lot of expectations to live up to. With a $149.99 price tag, you’d certainly hope it’ll be powerful and jam-packed full of value. Thankfully for money-conscious players, it seems you’re definitely getting your money’s worth with this deck.
New Stunning Secret Lair Spoilers!
To finish off this deck’s slow spoiler season, Wizards showcased the last remaining Secret Lair cards. Offering gorgeous, and totally adorable, new art, these cards are definitely the deck’s price jewels. Unfortunately, however, the latest cards to be revealed, a pair of tokens, might not be what players were hoping for.
For starters, as you can see above, the new Cat and Dog tokens by Allison Carl are utterly adorable. As a result of these good looks, you may understandably want to own quite a few of these Tokens. Considering that Rin and Seri, Inseparable are Token-based, this seems like a necessity. Unfortunately, however, each deck only contains two.
As explained by Wizards of the Coast, each Raining Cats and Dogs deck only includes two tokens with new art. These are packaged alongside 11 other tokens from a variety of recent sets. Since these tokens offer Cat Beasts, Shapeshifters, and Rats, these tokens are useful, however, it’s nonetheless disappointing. If every land in the deck has stunning Secret Lair art, why can’t the tokens?
Thankfully, while the tokens may be so good they’re disappointing, they’re hardly the only Secret Lair cards in this deck. Annointed Procession, for instance, was also technically revealed today. As a $45 reprint with amazing new reversible art, this is definitely something to be excited about. Technically, however, we have seen it before thanks to an accidental early reveal, so we can’t exactly call it new.
What we can call new, however, is the unreleased Sol Ring that has now been confirmed for the deck. Right now, sadly, we don’t know exactly what this Sol Ring will look like, however, we do know it has reversible artwork. Since it’s one of the deck’s new Secret Lair cards, hopefully, it will look utterly fantastic.
Fitting, Functional, and Fantastic Reprints!
As we mentioned before, alongside showcasing the new Secret Lair cards, Wizards also debuted the entire decklist. This means MTG players finally know what they’re in for on Monday. With $270 of value contained within the deck, it seems MTG players are in for a seriously good deal!
As expected, a large part of this enticing value is made up by the new Secret Lair cards. Comprising $86 of value on their own, these cards are impressive, however, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Thanks to the expected scarcity of this deck, and the gorgeous art, these new copies may well sell for significantly more.
While we may not know the final resting value of the new Secret Lair cards, we can at least analyze the known reprints. Thankfully, here Raining Cats and Dogs doesn’t disappoint either, as there are plenty of Commander staples. Costing around $15 each, Brimaz, King of Oreskos and Qasali Slingers are both getting reprinted.
Alongside these staples cats, this Secret Lair deck also features a staple Naya land Jetmir’s Garden. Currently costing around $23, this reprint is great to see. While they’re not quite as expensive, the same is true of Lurking Predators, Highcliff Felidar, and Skullclamp.
Typically selling for $12, $8, and $7.50 respectively, there’s no doubt that the Raining Cats and Dogs deck has some great reprints. As nice as these are from a value perspective, however, you’ll likely not be pulling this deck apart. Rather than selling it for scraps, this deck is, first and foremost, designed to be played with. Considering it seems incredibly well made, it would be a real shame not to do that.
What Was Missed
Since both Cats and Dogs are well-established archetypes in Commander, there’s a lot Wizards had to get right. Thankfully, however, it seems they’ve mostly ticked all the boxes that players could want. With only a few cards being missed, this $150 deck appears to be well worth the money.
On the cat side of things, unfortunately, a few staples haven’t been included in this deck. Capable of being a massive threat Pride Sovereign is an incredibly popular card in Cat Typal decks. The same is true of Prowling Serpopard which offers some much-needed protection. Thankfully, at just $3 and $2 each, buying these cards hardly breaks the bank.
For better or worse, while a few fan-favorite Cats were missed, not many Dogs were. This is largely thanks to there not being a whole lot of Commander playable Dogs in MTG. That being said, however, Selfless Savior was missed, but they could be added in for cheap. Alternatively, for a bit of weird fun, you could throw in Comet, Stellar Pup as a flavorful Planeswalker.
Speaking of Planeswalkers, this deck doesn’t have any right out of the box. Initially, this might seem like an odd exclusion, however, Planeswalkers are hardly vital. If you wanted to add some, Ajani, the Greathearted is a compelling choice thanks to their go-wide buffs. Similarly, Ajani, Caller of the Pride can potentially build a massive board, provided you activate their ultimate.
At the end of the day, while it’s very possible to say that some cards have been missed, all in all, the deck looks great. So much so, in fact, that we can’t wait for January 22nd to roll around next week.
Prepare for Trouble and Make It Double Sided
Ultimately, since Raining Cats and Dogs looks so good, I’ll definitely be in line to buy one. This, however, is going to be the real make-or-break moment for the deck. Previously, Secret Lair Commander decks have been incredibly popular, selling out in an instant. Between scalpers, excited customers, and vendors all snapping up copies, just buying a deck can be difficult.
Right now, sadly, we don’t know exactly how many copies of this deck have been produced, or any systems Wizards has put in place. If we’re hopeful, Wizards will ensure that scalpers can’t ruin the fun, however, a sale is a sale. For better or worse, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens, and hope for the best.
As always, the Raining Cats and Dogs deck will be sold via the Secret Lair website. Good luck!
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