Following the major reveal of the new Commander bracket system, all eyes have been on Commander recently. Talk of potentially unbans and discussions about the brackets themselves have dominated the MTG space this week. Unsurprisingly, the thought of juicy Commander unbans has also caused a fair few price spikes already.
While Commander has been soaking up the limelight recently, it’s not the only MTG format that is being thoroughly interesting. Thanks to the release of Aetherdrift today there has been a lot of exciting innovation and experimentation. Even before this, Modern had been shaking things up with the new Orzhov Blink deck that has proven both powerful and popular.
As always, this deck’s impressive streak of results has led to movement in the MTG finance markets. We’ve already seen how Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd has tripped in price, but that’s not the only card seeing movement. Curiously, over the past month, Emperor of Bones has seen an incredibly similar price spike.
Emperor of Bones
Just like Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd, Emperor of Bones sees a lot of play in Orzhov Blink lists in Modern. These two cards, in fact, play off one another incredibly nicely. When used in conjunction, the creatures that Emperor of Bones briefly reanimates can be flickered by Phelia and kept around long-term.
Provided you can get them into your graveyard first, this synergy allows you to easily cheat out massive creatures. Haymaker threats like Overlord of the Balemurk or Solitude can be yours for essentially just two mana. Even though it does take some setup, there’s no denying that is a pretty sweet deal.
On top of blink-based shenanigans, Emperor of Bones is also a fantastic tool within more typical reanimator decks. In these lists, not only can Emperor reanimate your own threats in the bin, but it can steal your opponent’s too. Considering how popular Phlage, Titan of Fire’s Fury is in Modern, it’s hard not to get a great hit.
With all this in mind, it’s safe to say that Emperor of Bones has become a steadfast Modern staple in recent weeks. Outside of Modern, the card also sees play within some Legacy decks. Both Death & Taxes decks and reanimator lists have experimented with this card with impressive success.
Overall, there’s no denying that Emperor of Bones is a fantastic card that’s stuffed with synergy. Whether it’s being used alongside Phalia, or just tutored with Recruiter of the Guard, it’s hard to go wrong. With this in mind, it’s no wonder that this card has started to get rather expensive recently.
The Spike
As mentioned, just like Phelia, Emperor of Bones has roughly tripled in price over the past months. Given that both cards hail from Modern Horizons 3, it’s no coincidence that these cards have seen a similar spike. That said, Phelia does see a lot more play than Emperor of Bones since it’s also found in Boros Energy decks.
Despite this point of difference, Emperor of Bones has actually had a more impressive price spike over the past few months. Back in late November of last year, near mint examples of this card were selling for just $0.81. Fast-forward two and a bit months to today, and Emperor of Bones is now selling for $5.51 on average.
While this 580% price spike is already rather impressive, listings for Emperor of Bones begin at above this market price average. Right now, the least you’d pay is $5.97, but a lot of copies are in the $6.50+ range. Due to this, it may only be a matter of time before its price climbs even higher.
Notably, the price of Emperor of Bones has been climbing, rather than outright spiking in recent weeks. As demand for this card has picked up thanks to its performance in Modern, its price has also steadily increased. Unsurprisingly, this steady increase can be seen across all variants of Emperor of Bones.
Both the Prerelease and Extended Art variants of Emperor of Bones have also roughly tripled in price over the past month. Current listings for these variants start at $12.50 and $7.72, so sadly, there are no discount deals available. That said, Emperor of Bones is still mercifully not too expensive in the grand scheme of Modern.
The Future
Given the slow and steady spike that Emperor of Bones has seen, it feels rather unlikely that the price will crash anytime soon. For better or worse, this tends to happen a lot to the hardest price spikes, since the supply gets bought out incredibly quickly. The short-term reaction to this is that prices go wild, but it doesn’t take long for players to start selling off their investments.
Since the price increase of Emperor of Bones has been a slow burn, it appears to be mostly driven by players, rather than investors. The card is needed for two popular Modern archetypes, and the decks’ players are unlikely to part with their copies. While there are bound to be some investors, as always, they’ve not bought out the card.
Currently, on TCGplayer, there are around 60 near-mint copies of Emperor of Bones left available for purchase. Looking at the impressive sales history of the card, this supply might not last long at all. Should a buyout eventually end up happening, a proper spike to Emperor of Bones’ price might happen after all.
Ultimately, as always, we’ll just have to wait and see what happens to this card’s price. Given the card is popular in Modern, there’s a good chance it’ll remain somewhat expensive, even if the price fluctuates.