While the set’s spoiler season isn’t done yet, MTG Star Trek is looking like a very exciting set all around. The two precons that have been revealed so far, for instance, both look great, and the Scene Boxes are equally rather spicy. Despite this, MTG Star Trek is yet to take over Magic’s secondary markets and cause countless spikes.
Instead, throughout the past week, we’ve seen Reality Fracture and Mystery Booster: Commander Edition leading the charge. Miraculously, these spikes just keep on coming, too, with a Reality Fracture Commander continuing to cause spikes. Most recently, Bronzebeak Foragers has jumped significantly in price thanks to solid synergy.
MTG Bronzebeak Foragers
Released within the Veloci-Ramp-Tor precon from The Lost Caverns of Ixalan, Bronzebeak Foragers is potentially very strong. Essentially, this card is a prison effect that hits each opponent, giving you tons of value for four mana. You can even send the exiled cards to the graveyard, keeping opponents from getting them back, with enough mana.
Thanks to this general utility, Bronzebeak Foragers quickly proved to be pretty popular in Commander. To date, this card is in well over 41,000 Commander decks, although most of those are Dinosaur-focused. Unsurprisingly,
Pantlaza, Sun-Favored
Pantlaza, Sun-Favored
Whenever Pantlaza or another Dinosaur you control enters, you may discover X, where X is that creature's toughness. Do this only once each turn. (Exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a nonland card with that mana value or less. Cast it without paying its mana cost or put it into your hand. Put the rest on the bottom in a random order.)
is the card’s most popular home with over 25,000 lists, since it originated in that precon.
While this is largely a Dinosaur Typal card, plenty of other decks can still have strong synergy with Bronzebeak Foragers.
Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines
Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines
Vigilance
If a permanent entering causes a triggered ability of a permanent you control to trigger, that ability triggers an additional time.
Permanents entering don't cause abilities of permanents your opponents control to trigger.
, for instance, can let you steal a whole lot more, while
Ketramose, the New Dawn
Ketramose, the New Dawn
Menace, lifelink, indestructible
Ketramose can't attack or block unless there are seven or more cards in exile.
Whenever one or more cards are put into exile from graveyards and/or the battlefield during your turn, you draw a card and lose 1 life.
has great exile synergies. More recently, Bronzebeak Foragers have also seen a strong uptick in play thanks to
Dack Fayden, Helping Hand
Dack Fayden, Helping Hand
When Dack Fayden enters, reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal X creature cards, where X is the number of opponents you have. Put those creature cards onto the battlefield, then shuffle. They're goaded for the rest of the game. For each of those permanents, choose a different opponent. Each opponent gains control of the permanent for which they were chosen.
.
When hitting Bronzebeak Foragers with Dack Fayden, any enters abilities will go onto the stack after the creatures are given away. This means that Bronzebeak Foragers will be a valid target for itself, allowing you to use it like a flicker effect. At the very least, this can bring back the creatures you just donated, while doubling up on enters effects.
Considering Dack Fayden, Helping Hand decks are largely built around cheating creatures then flickering them back under your control; the synergy here is perfect. With this in mind, it’s little wonder that there are almost 1,000 Dack Fayden decks using Bronzebeak Foragers already. This, in turn, has caused an impressive price spike, with Bronzebeak Foragers more than quadrupling in price.
A Surprisingly Strong Spike
While Bronzebeak Foragers does have very strong synergy with Dack Fayden, Helping Hand, its financial impact is certainly surprising. Admittedly, this Dinosaur still isn’t that expensive, but it really hasn’t taken that much to move the markets. In the past month, there have only been around 250 near-mint sales of Bronzebeak Foragers, but that’s left only 25 listings remaining.
Due to this low supply, prices have been quick to balloon from around $0.77 this time last month. Now, the cheapest near-mint copy of Bronzebeak Foragers will set you back $3.29, marking a 327% price spike. Thankfully, while the demand spike has pushed prices up across the board, there are some cheaper alternatives.
For starters, a lightly played default frame copy of Bronzebeak Foragers can be purchased for $1.71 at the moment. That said, while copies at this price point do exist, they’re in very short supply, and prices ramp up to $2 and then $3 rather quickly. Should you want to stick with near-mint examples, however, then the extended art variant is also an option.
Currently, near-mint extended art copies are currently selling for around $2.65, and there’s a fair bit of supply remaining, too. Admittedly, prices do quickly creep up as usual, but with 66 listings remaining, it shouldn’t be an immediate second spike. That’s the hope, at least, but the future of MTG price spikes is often rather murky.
A Future Classic?
While Bronzebeak Foragers already sees a fair bit of play in Commander, it feels like it’s only now hitting its stride. Thanks to Dack Fayden, this potential of this Dinosaur has been supercharged, and the end result is wildly powerful. Right now, in fact, it seems that Dack Fayden, Helping Hand is hands down the best Commander in MTG, which is wild.
In theory, should Dack Fayden remain popular, then Bronzebeak Foragers should continue to be an auto-include in Dack decks. While this could contribute to a long-term increase in demand, nothing in MTG is certain. There’s a chance, for instance, that Dack Fayden could end up being banned, although that is far from guaranteed.
Even if Dack doesn’t end up getting hit in some way, popularity around this new Commander could fade over time. If this happens, then Bronzebeak Foragers could easily go back to just being a Dinosaur Typal card once again. This, in turn, could cause the card’s price to plummet back down to past lows, but equally it could remain around $2-$3.
Realistically, since Bronzebeak Foragers isn’t a bad card that’s only good in typal decks, it costing a few dollars wouldn’t be unheard of. This could all change if it gets reprinted, of course, but predicting that is definitely more art than science. As such, we can only really wait and see what happens in the coming months, and enjoy the Star Trek spoilers in the meantime.
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