Today, the Magic: The Gathering world received a surprise. We got a set of two unexpected Secret Lair drops, which are trying something totally new. Rather than just being standalone products, as is the Secret Lair norm, these drops are designed to augment the new Edge of Eternities Commander decks. Featuring: Deathburger, for example, is a Secret Lair drop full of upgrades for the Counter Intelligence precon.
Alongside Alien Auroras, this drop forms a range known as ‘Commander Reinforcements.’ It’s a new direction for Secret Lair, and one that could become a regular fixture depending on how things go with these two.
Reasonable Value Hits
Unlike normal Secret Lair drops, today’s drops have two axes they need to succeed on. They need to provide good value for their costs, and they need to present worthy upgrades for their respective decks. In both of these categories, Featuring: Deathburger is a mixed bag.
There are certainly some decent value cards here, with Arcbound Ravager being the biggest hit, coming in at $10 for a regular copy. The card still retains some of its notoriety from when it got banned in Standard back in 2005, at which point it was probably one of the best cards in the game. Today, it’s still a very solid piece in artifact decks. Instant speed sacrifice is great, especially with a permanent reward. This card is a decent upgrade to Counter Intelligence, too, since it plays nicely with Proliferate.
Goblin Engineer is another solid card for the drop. This is a fixed Goblin Welder, which trades in being able to reanimate any artifact for a handy artifact Entomb ability. It’s a regular feature in artifact-centric Commander decks, and as such, commands a $6.50 price tag. You’ll pretty much always be able to use that second ability in Counter Intelligence, and there are a ton of great three-or-less mana artifacts you can grab. Uthros Research Craft, one of the deck’s best draw engines, is a particularly juicy example.
The last card of notable value here is Ethersworn Canonist. It’s a bit of a Stax piece, restricting your opponents to one spell a turn while your artifact deck goes unrestricted. As with the above cards, it’s a decent Commander playable that packs a $5 price tag. It’s a decent addition to Counter Intelligence, but probably lacks the synergy necessary to fully earn a spot.
Into The Bulk
The other Counter Intelligence upgrades in the Featuring: Deathburger Secret Lair drop are, unfortunately, both duds. Foundry Inspector is an okay card in any artifact deck, offering a one mana discount on all of your plays. It’s hardly exciting in 2025, however, due largely to its frail 3/2 body. You can get copies for around $0.30 right now, so its inclusion here feels like a missed opportunity on two fronts.
Dance of the Manse is similar. Mass artifact reanimation is interesting, but Counter Intelligence lacks the kind of ramp to really make the best of it consistently. The art also feels like a bit of a flavor fail, given the card’s fairy tale roots. This one is worth a bit more than Inspector at around $0.60, but it’s probably a worse addition to Counter Intelligence as a deck.
Overall, Featuring: Deathburger feels like a bit of a miss. The total value here is only about $22.50, which is well under the $29.99 asking price. On top of that, Canonist, Inspector, and Dance aren’t even particularly good upgrades for Counter Intelligence. For much less money, you can pick up much better pieces, like Freed from the Real, Dreamtide Whale, and even Walking Ballista. As far as this Secret Lair experiment goes, the Alien Auroras drop handles things much better, in terms of both card value and upgrades.
A Compelling Bundle
Of course, there is one final element of this drop to consider. You can buy Featuring: Deathburger alone, or in a bundle with the Counter Intelligence Commander precon. This bundle costs around $75 in non-foil and $105 in ‘Galaxy Foil.’
With this bundle in the mix, the math on Featuring: Deathburger changes. Market price for the deck alone is about $55 right now, edging up into the $60 range in some cases. With this in mind, you’re essentially getting the drop for $15-20 here if you buy the bundle. At that price, you actually will make a small profit over the baseline prices. Not to mention the expected Secret Lair markup, which will likely see these printings eclipse the originals in terms of value anyway.
For this reason alone, the Counter Intelligence upgrades Secret Lair drop could be worth buying. You’re pretty much guaranteed to break even here, with the potential for making money back if the Lair itself climbs in the future. In the meantime, you get a pretty exciting new precon to play with.
That said, it is a bit disappointing to see Wizards pick an underwhelming range of cards for this drop. Commander Reinforcements is a fantastic idea, giving Secret Lair drops a built-in audience that they lacked in the past. Seeing these for every precon would be really interesting, and could potentially get newer players invested in Secret Lair. With cards like these, however, that’s unlikely. Hopefully, if Wizards tries this again, they’ll use the Alien Auroras drop as the blueprint and not this one.
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