Of all the new cards to come out of Modern Horizons 2, Esper Sentinel is one of the most played across all Magic: the Gathering formats. It is EVERYWHERE and for good reason–it is an absurd source of card draw in white, a color that typically lacks such effects in MTG. There’s a high demand for Esper Sentinel which is naturally making the card more expensive.
Esper Sentinel
Esper Sentinel is quickly approaching $30.00! When MH2 was first released, the card was about $13.00. It had a small spike in price in January and since then, continued to trend upwards as seen in the graph below.
At the time of writing the regular art printing is about $28.00 and the showcase printing reached $30.00. If you’re lucky, you can still find a few slightly cheaper listings on TCGPlayer.
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What are the Best Decks For Esper Sentinel?
Wizards of the Coast designed MH2 specifically for the Modern format. But many cards, like Esper Sentinel, made big impacts on Commander too.
Commander
Esper Sentinel is like a mini version of Rhystic Study, a long-time Commander superstar. Pretty much every white Commander deck on the cEDH Database plays Esper Sentinel. (cEDH is considered to be the most competitive form of Commander.)
While any Commander deck will appreciate Sentinel’s efficient card draw, some decks have additional synergies with the Human Soldier. Strategies revolved around +1/+1 counters, such as Ghave, Guru of Spores, can increase Sentinel’s taxing ability. Death & Taxes decks like Grand Arbiter Augustin IV use sentinel as another way to imprison your opponents. And because Esper Sentinel is an artifact, it synergizes with Commanders like Oswald Fiddlebender.
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Modern
Esper Sentinel is used in a variety of Modern decks such as Hammer Time, Affinity, Death & Taxes, Hardened Scales, and my personal favorite, Boros Midrange.
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How Expensive Will Esper Sentinel Become?
You can still find MH2 packs on the shelves at stores. This is the one thing preventing Esper Sentinel from absolutely exploding in price.
But once Wizards of the Coast stops printing the set, many MH2 cards will start gradually creeping up in price. This holds especially true for ubiquitously played cards like Urza’s Saga, Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer, and Esper Sentinel.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Esper Sentinel reaches $35.00 in the future. It could even get as high as $40.00.
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