Historically, Standard hasn’t had much weight in the vast world of MTG finance. While it’s been the go-to format on MTG Arena for some time, on paper it has struggled in recent years. Since 2020 a distinct lack of in-person events and competitive support hamstrung the format, pushing competitive and casual players elsewhere.
Looking ahead into 2025, however, it seems a new dawn for Standard is finally upon us. For starters, Wizards has increased the number of Standard-legal sets being released from four to six. For better or worse, three of these sets are Universes Beyond crossovers, which are bound to drive increased interest.
As if all that wasn’t enough, Wizards is amping up Standard’s competitive appeal with three RCQ seasons next year. Even though we’re not quite in 2025 yet, these moves have unsurprisingly massively increased interest in the format. A lot more players are building decks, playing events, and subsequently buying cards. Unsurprisingly, all this attention has caused a fair few price spikes.
Anoint with Affliction
- Mana Value: 1B
- Rarity: Common
- Card Type: Instant
Card Text: Exile target creature if it has mana value 3 or less.
Corrupted — Exile that creature instead if its controller has three or more poison counters.
You may be somewhat surprised that Anoint with Affliction is one of the premier go-to removal spells in MTG right now. In Standard, and every other format for that matter, Poison hasn’t been relevant for quite some time. Following the release of Phyrexia: All Will Be One, the archetype was decent in Standard but we’ve come a long way since then.
Nowadays, you’re just not going to hit the Corrupted threshold that is meant to make Anoint with Affliction playable. That said, the card is still seeing play in a great many decks that theoretically have no business running it. It turns out that exiling a three-mana, or less, creature is exactly what Standard needs right now.
Currently, Anoint with Affliction appears in a great deal of Dimir Midrange and Golgari Demons decks in Standard. Three or four copies are found in a lot of decks, although only one or two start in the main board. While midrange decks are rather popular at the moment, Anoint with Affliction is invaluable against a great deal of the competition.
Right now, a lot of the best threats in Standard are three-mana bombs. Zur, Eternal Schemer, for example, is a key threat that the Domain Overlords strategy depends upon. Similarly, Valley Floodcaller and Enduring Vitality both fall under the three-mana threshold. The same is true for Abhorrent Oculus and Haughty Djinn which are found in Azorius Tempo.
Essentially, it doesn’t matter that Anoint with Affliction can technically only hit some creatures, as it hits more than enough. Beyond just killing these threats, Anoint with Affliction exiles them to stop any reanimation or graveyard shenanigans. For much the same reasons, Anoint with Affliction is also fairly popular in Pioneer at the moment too.
The Spike
Unlike many major price spikes, Anoint with Affliction isn’t a new innovation in Standard or Pioneer by any means. The card has always been on people’s radars, and while it’s good, players haven’t been scrambling to buy it. Considering the card is a common, doing so seems like you’d be getting worked up over nothing.
Despite appearances, however, this humble common MTG card has become seriously expensive. At the time of writing, the market price for Anoint with Affliction sits at $3.70. This, obviously, is quite a lot for an otherwise unassuming common card. Looking at recent sales, it appears players are fairly content buying copies at this price.
Since Anoint with Affliction is nothing new, it appears this price spike has simply been caused by steady long-term demand. Sales volume for the card shows consistency outside of a major recent spike of almost 150 copies being bought. If anything is to have caused the price spike, it will have been this increased flurry of activity.
Currently, on TCGplayer, there are only 46 copies of Anoint with Affliction left available for purchase. Starting at $3.69, it seems the supply of this card is very much running out in the face of demand from Standard players. In theory, this could mean this card’s price could spike even harder, as copies become somewhat difficult to obtain.
The Fall?
While Anoint with Affliction does appear to be weirdly rare right now, it really shouldn’t be. Even though the card is popular in Standard and Pioneer, there should be more than enough copies to go around. There’s not a great deal of demand for this card in Commander, so it shouldn’t be actual gold dust.
With this in mind, it seems likely that the price of Anoint with Affliction will fall and stabilize before too too long. It may be at an all-time high at the moment, but if the card suddenly drops out of Standard, demand for it will disappear. On top of this, sellers looking to cash in on higher prices may inadvertently flood the market and unintentionally lower prices.
Ultimately, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens to Anoint with Affliction. For now, there’s no question that this is a potent removal spell and it definitely deserves some of its price tag. Whether or not it will last long at almost $4, however, remains to be seen.
