Between The Hobbit becoming legal tomorrow and Mystery Booster Commander Edition just being revealed, it’s all go in the world of MTG right now. Naturally, this has caused some pretty big price spikes recently, especially thanks to the wild new rule-breaking mechanics. Even outside of these cards, however, there’s still plenty to be excited about, such as the new Smaug the Impenetrable.
Between this new Smaug and a new legend from Mystery Booster Commander Edition, demand for Last Laugh is way up. This decades-old enchantment might seem pretty bad on the surface, but with the right support, it’s a truly deadly threat.
MTG Last Laugh
Since it deals damage to each creature and player whenever something dies, Last Laugh is terrible in its ideal archetype. In theory, Aristocrats decks would adore this card; however, it’d quickly kill off all their own support pieces. After this, Last Laugh would kill itself, too, so it does take a special kind of deck to make it work.
Thankfully, Wizards of the Coast just released two homes for Last Laugh that are literally perfect. The new Smaug the Impenetrable, for instance, is insane with this card as it creates an effortless new infinite combo. Since Smaug taking damage from Last Laugh creates a Treasure, and sacrificing a Treasure triggers Last Laugh, this infinite loop is insanely easy to set up.
With this combo, the only thing you have to watch out for is burning yourself out before each opponent. So long as you have more life than anyone else when starting this loop, however, winning should be trivial. Considering this combo also makes you near-infinite mana, too, securing victory is only a formality.
Even when you’re not going infinite, Last Laugh is just a great card to have in a Smaug deck. The same is also true for the new Sahir, Visitor in Darkness from Mystery Booster Commander Edition. Thanks to gaining +1/+1 counters whenever you take exactly one damage, Sahir is effectively also immune to Last Laugh.
While Sahir doesn’t create a new infinite combo on its own, you can still easily wrack up counters for added power. This turns Sahir into even more of a menacing Commander Damage clock, especially if you lean into sacrifice synergies. Unsurprisingly, thanks to this strength with both Sahir and Smaug, demand for Last Laugh has shot up.
The Spike
Originally, while Last Laugh did see some play in Indoraptor, the Perfect Hybrid decks, this card lacked a good home. As a result, according to EDHREC, the card only appeared in around 5,000 decks. Now, Smaug and Sahair are bumping that count up, albeit only by around 200 lists so far.
While this might not seem like much of an increase in play, evidently, it’s had a major impact on Last Laugh’s price. Even with only 52 near-mint sales happening in the last month, prices have still jumped by over 634%. With sales recently peaking at $17.99, the past average price of around $2.45 is now sadly long gone.
Sadly, even if you don’t mind picking up a worse-condition example, the price of Last Laugh is up across the board. With damaged copies starting at $7.97, and lightly played examples selling for $12.13, this is no longer a budget card. This status could easily change, however, should Last Laugh ever be reprinted.
No Supply, Some Demand
While it does now have some insane new homes, admittedly, Last Laugh is far from perfect. In most Commander decks, this card is a major risk that can easily blow up your own board. It can work wonders with the right support, of course, but the chances of it being a dead card are rather high.
With this in mind, it hardly feels like Last Laugh is a sure thing going forward. The new Smaug and Sahair should maintain higher demand than usual, of course, but even this is capped. With this two-card combo pushing Smaug into bracket 4 and Sahir potentially facing supply issues, neither Commander is perfect.
On top of these issues, it’s worth noting that Last Laugh is only expensive due to its incredibly low supply at the moment. As a rare that has only ever been printed in Torment, there aren’t many copies in existence, let alone near-mint examples. If this card does get reprinted, however, then a new wave of supply would undoubtedly cause its price to crash.
Sadly, while Last Laugh could be reprinted, there’s no guarantee that it will be. Due to this, we can only wait and see what happens to this card’s price in the medium and long term. As for the short term, don’t be surprised if prices continue to climb, as Smaug and Sahir’s full release is happening soon.
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