The spoiler season for Edge of Eternities has been very up and down. As usual, there was a lot of hype around the set’s two preconstructed decks, and the flavor has overall been fantastic. From a power level perspective, however, this set is very mediocre. Unlike Final Fantasy, our list of the best Edge of Eternities Commanders didn’t have much exciting competition.
With this in mind, it’s perhaps not the biggest surprise that MTG players are turning their attention back toward Final Fantasy. Commander players, in particular, have been moving the markets, as always, causing past synergies to spike once again. Not only have equipment cards been consistently on the rise, but Birds are still on the up and up, too.
Kangee, Aerie Keeper
Hailing from Invasion, way back in the 2000s, Kangee, Aerie Keeper is pretty meh on the surface. Unless you pay the kicker cost, Kangee is a 2/2 with Flying for four mana, which is terrible by today’s standards. Thankfully, things do get a lot better once you start paying Kangee’s Kicker cost, but that doesn’t come cheap either.
At the very least, you’re going to have to spend seven mana on Kangee, Aerie Keeper. For all that, you’ll now be getting a 3/3, while buffing all your other Birds too. This body and effect are still terribly overcosted; however, Kangee gets significantly better the more mana you have.
If you have ten mana available, Kangee can offer a solid +4/+4 buff to all Birds. While this obviously isn’t cheap, the more mana you can sink into Kangee, the better. Since Bird Typal decks tend to go rather wide nowadays, you can get tons of value from this Kicker effect.
Notably, Kangee, Aerie Keeper does affect all birds, not just the ones that you control. Thankfully, this effect isn’t going to matter in a lot of games; however, there are some prolific Birds in Commander. Birds of Paradise, Ledger Shredder, and Baleful Strix are all common cards that you may inadvertently end up buffing.
While this may seem like a rather damning downside, Bird-based buffs will be significantly more valuable for a Typal deck. Thanks to this, Kangee, Aerie Keeper has long been a popular choice for Bird Typal Commander decks. According to EDHREC, Kangee is the third most popular choice for the archetype.
Notably, Kangee, Aerie Keeper does work especially well with Choco, Seeker of Paradise. Thanks to this Bird’s additional focus on lands, you should have plenty of mana to sink into Kangee.
The Spike
Unlike many of the price spikes that we cover, near mint copies of Kangee, Aerie Keeper aren’t the most popular or profitable. This may have something to do with the fact that Kangee is now 25 years old and largely unplayable outside of Bird Typal. Due to this, it’s unlikely many players focused on preserving pristine copies.
Over the past three months, only 55 near-mint copies have been sold on TCGplayer. Prices of these are now pushing $8.85; however, sales at this price point are very slow. In comparison, 137 moderately played copies have been sold in the same time frame. Prices for copies in this condition now start at $7.45, and copies have actually been selling for this price.
As you can see above, the majority of sales for Kangee, Aerie Keeper took place around the release of the Final Fantasy set. As mentioned, many Choco, Seeker of Paradise decks have strong synergy with Kangee, so this makes a lot of sense. Since then, however, sales haven’t completely died out, allowing prices to continually climb.
While the price spike to Kangee, Aerie Keeper has been slow going, before sales picked up, copies were selling for just $0.98. Notably, while moderately played copies of Kangee from Invasion have been selling the most, there is a reprint available. Thanks to The List, there were some near-mint copies of Kangee available.
Sadly, almost all of these have now been bought up. Between both printings of Kangee, Aerie Keeper, there are now very few copies available for purchase. The cheapest of these now start at around $4.50, although that is for a heavily played copy.
The Future
Most of the time, a lot of explosive Commander-based price spikes can be rather short-lived. When investors spec on a new synergy, they’ll quickly buy up all the available copies, causing prices to surge. After this, these copies will be steadily drip-fed onto the market to realize the potential profits. Over time, as demand dies down, so do prices, in order to keep the markets moving.
For many of the Bird-based price spikes that we’ve seen recently, however, the story is different. Since they’re more-so driven by interested players, the spikes have taken longer but are seemingly more resilient. Soulcatchers’ Aerie, for instance, has held its $8+ price after spiking from $0.68 back in May.
The same is true for Flurry of Wings, which is now selling for around $7 on average. While prices have fluctuated somewhat within recent weeks, sales have been impressively steady. Obviously, part of this will be down to Bird Typal still being popular; however, these cards are actually being played.
Due to this, it’s unlikely that most MTG players will sell their decades-old Bird cards when the flavor of the month passes. For the most part, players tend to keep their decks, so supply for these old Bird staples may not be replenished. If this trend continues, then prices for Kangee, Aerie Keeper, and other Bird Typal cards may remain high. Whether or not that will happen, however, remains to be seen.
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