Since the reveal of both Edge of Eternities precons in their entirety, multiple synergistic tools that didn’t appear in the decklists have risen in price significantly. “Lands matter” cards like Zask, Skittering Swarmlord and Tiller Engine have spiked as potent upgrades for the World Shaper deck. Meanwhile, Proliferate staples such as Filigree Vector have ballooned in value thanks to the Counter Intelligence deck.
Now, we have another rising artifact to share that fits the Proliferate theme well. This card is very strong when well supported and even goes infinite alongside multiple cards from the precon!
Magistrate’s Scepter
This time around, the card that’s spiking is Magistrate’s Scepter. On its own, this artifact is incredibly mediocre. Having to pay four mana and tap this artifact three times before you get your reward is not worth the hassle. When it starts to pull its weight is when you have alternative ways to get charge counters on it.
Well, what better way to accomplish this task than by shoving Scepter in a deck with tons of Proliferate cards. From Thrummingbird to the secondary Commander Kilo, Apogee Mind, the Counter Intelligence precon has tons of ways to add charge counters to Scepter at will.
Of course, the face Commander, Inspirit, Flagship Vessel, makes it trivial to get to three charge counters on Scepter. Unlike with Proliferate, you don’t even have to go through the effort of paying four mana to put the first charge counter on Scepter. Inspirit does that for you and sets up your Proliferate synergies nicely.
On top of that, there are multiple ways to take infinite turns just by adding Scepter to the precon with no other changes. Inspirit reliably sets up the first two charge counters at the beginning of combat. As long as you have another way to add a charge counter during your turn, such as by connecting with Thrummingbird or attacking with Kilo, you can tap Scepter to take an extra turn and repeat this process.
Without Inspirit in the mix, you can also set up infinite turns with Coretapper and Emry, Lurker of the Loch. Just sacrifice Coretapper to add two charge counters to Scepter, replay Coretapper with Emry, sacrifice it again, and take another turn. There’s a reason why Scepter is seeing a major increase in demand.
The Spike
This increased demand is largely responsible for Scepter spiking in price over the last few days. From the beginning of June until July 8, non-foil copies of Scepter from Core Set 2019 consistently sat between 69 cents and 86 cents, according to TCGplayer market price.
July 8 happens to be when the face Commanders for both Edge of Eternities precons were revealed. Players were clearly quick to recognize how strong Scepter was alongside Inspirit, as demand skyrocketed immediately after. For reference, from July 1 to July 7, only 26 separate sales were made on TCGplayer for the Core Set 2019 version of Scepter. By contrast, over 40 sales were made on July 8 alone. A handful of purchases featured 10 or more copies being sold at once, too.
Demand increased even further following the preview of the full Counter Intelligence decklist on July 10. Once players realized Scepter wasn’t getting a reprint, many jumped on the bandwagon, with 81 purchases made that day.
Scepter’s market price has already climbed from 69 cents to $3. Given how fast supply has plummeted, though, current listings are even higher, with the lowest near-mint option coming at $4.75, not including shipping fees. Multiple recent sales went for $4.99, which represents a 623% spike.
The Mercadian Masques variant of Scepter has followed similar patterns. Only six sales went through from July 1 to July 7, followed by a huge uptick in demand on July 8 and forward.
Notably, market price is only $2.93 here. While supply is low, more players have been purchasing Core Set 2019 copies than Mercadian Masques ones. Regardless, there are only six near mint Mercadian Masques listings currently, so the market price is likely to increase in the near future.
The Future
As is the case when any new Commander precon gets previewed, the price of Scepter has spiked mostly because of player hype surrounding the decks. Demand is through the roof, and supply has fallen dramatically. This is a classic recipe for spikes in the short term.
Scepter’s rise hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down yet, and it may take some time before demand falls. It’s impossible to predict the future, but it seems likely that as attention to the Edge of Eternities precons lessens, so will this card’s price.
Plus, it’s not like Magistrate Scepter is a generically powerful card you can slot into many decks. You need a lot of synergies, or the card is awful, simply put. There’s a reason the card was so cheap just a week ago. Don’t be surprised if its price drops over the course of the next few months.
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