Magic’s recent releases have come with rules changes that, arguably, have impacted the game more than the releases themselves. For Final Fantasy, in an attempt to aid the effectiveness of Summons, a Rules Change was made to keep them in play if they lost their abilities. This ended up becoming a major buff for Urza’s Saga players.
Unlike the Final Fantasy Rules Change, Edge of Eternities’ big Commander change shouldn’t have a major impact on the format, but it is significant. You can now run Legendary Vehicles and Legendary Spacecraft as Commanders!
This means that RMS Titanic, among some other options, are now viable as Commanders.
RMS Titanic
RMS Titanic may be a viable Commander thanks to Edge of Eternities, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a good one. That said, using the Titanic as a delayed ritual and climbing from four mana to 11 in one shot is certainly quirky.
When built around, this does have the potential to be seriously powerful. Doubling your Treasure mana with Goldspan Dragon, for example, puts you up 14 mana. Casting a game-ending spell, after connecting with an RMS Titanic can put you incredibly far ahead.
Since your Treasure token generation is linked to RMS Titanic’s damage, you can also use damage-doubling and power-doubling spells to create even more Treasure Tokens. City on Fire is an effect that you can both ramp to and use to create even more Treasures.
Even though RMS Titanic is Mono-Red, you have a decent collection of powerful spells to cast, as well. Call Forth the Tempest, for example, puts you ahead two spells, and, more often than not, will wipe your opponent’s creatures. Dance with Calamity, Apex of Power, and Etali, Primal Conqueror, all have the potential to create a lot of value.
If you wanted to play RMS Titanic at its best, you would likely turn to land destruction spells. As efficient as this is, destroying lands is akin to social death in Commander unless it’s very clear that doing so is ok for the table.
All of this is to say that, while RMS Titanic is undeniably a casual Commander, you can do some powerful things with it. Now that you can play as a Commander, interest has increased in the card.
The Spike
Right after the Commander rules change was announced, RMS Titanic saw a massive surge in demand. 602 copies exchanged hands over a three-day period after the card was officially deemed a legal Commander. This kicked off the card’s price spike from $0.45 to $2.19 over the course of a few days.
That said, the actual sales price for RMS Titanic is still rather inconsistent. Copies are selling for anywhere between $0.75 and $3, but most Near Mint copies are consistently over a dollar. At the time of writing, the cheapest near-mint copy of RMS Titanic available on TCGplayer is retailing for $2.19. Lightly played copies, however, are consistently going for under a dollar.
Traditional Foil RMS Titanics do have a consistent premium, going for $2+ while showing signs of climbing. There are a fair number of other treatments, as well, but all are showing signs of trending upwards. Extended art RMS Titanics start at $3.41, trending upwards towards $5. Traditional Extended foils pick up around $5 and trend towards $8.
Moving on to Surge Foils, purchases for the traditional frame Surge Foil are very far and few between, but they’re rather expensive. The most recent purchase was at $16.84, and the cheapest available copy of the card now surpasses $18. Extended Surge Foil is now going for about $30. All variants of RMS Titanic are currently spiking aggressively, but note that the rarer variants have very few sales, so take these numbers with a grain of salt.
Not as Desirable as it Seems
This would normally be a very difficult card to try and predict, mainly because we haven’t had a Commander rules change introduce a bunch of new Commanders before. That said, the most likely outcome for RMS Titanic, in the long run, is to settle down after a massive spike, and some trends point towards that happening rather quickly.
To be clear, RMS Titanic’s spike looks like it will continue, but multiple things point to the card falling flat sooner than expected. Notably, there are a lot more copies of traditional nonfoil RMS Titanics on the market than there normally are for spikes like this, so if demand does stall out, the card might start to find its price point very quickly.
Perhaps the most important thing to note is that there have been a few sales buying upwards of 216 copies of the card, so there is a buyout element at play here. This almost certainly means that the demand surge between June 20th and 22nd was artificially inflated.
There was certainly a group of MTG players snatching up an RMS Titanic to Crew up as a Commander, but those players only need one. There could be some more Vehicle-focused synergies coming out in future sets that have players interested in RMS Titanic in the 99, but this card is largely unremarkable. Anyone trying to build a Treasure deck using Sonic-related synergies, however, might have an interest in RMS Titanic.
Buyer beware is our suggestion with RMS Titanic. Ultimately, $2-$3 is not a lot to pay, but if you’re trying to stretch your dollar, you might be better off waiting for demand to slow down. Of course, we could be entirely wrong, as it’s impossible to truly predict the future.