For many players, the March 31st ban announcement ended up being rather disappointing. Standard was untouched, despite its stale metagame, and only the bare minimum was done for Modern. Thankfully, it wasn’t all bad news, as Pauper got an interesting pair of unbans alongside three bans.
As we often see, these unbans have opened up new archetypes within Pauper’s metagame, which players have been keenly exploring. The unbanning of High Tide, in particular, has enabled the High Tide combo deck to emerge. Unsurprisingly, Pauper players have been picking up its component pieces now that this new deck is putting up compelling results.
Merchant Scroll
Until recently, Merchant Scroll didn’t see a great deal of play in Pauper, but this card is seriously strong. Merchant Scroll is so strong, in fact, that it’s actually restricted in Vintage and sees a good amount of play there. Found within a fair few archetypes, but primarily Paradoxical Outcome lists, Scroll is a fantastic low-cost tutor.
Admittedly, Merchant Scroll does come with a pretty hefty catch of only being able to tutor a blue instant. Within decks like mono blue High Tide combo, however, this is the opposite of a problem. In this archetype, Scroll is simply a reliable way to find copies of High Tide or Psychic Puppetry with basically no downside.
While High Tide combo decks are already no slouch, this added consistency makes the archetype fiercely competitive. Thankfully, High Tide hasn’t completely overtaken the Pauper metagame, but it’s nonetheless proving popular. As the metagame adapts and shifts over time, a lot of players will be watching this deck’s performance.
The Spike
As usual, whenever a card gets unbanned, a lot of MTG players quickly rush out and start buying. Not only do unbans often create an exciting new deck to play, but there’s often real money to be made. After all, if an unbanned card breaks the meta, it’ll quickly become a hot commodity.
As mentioned, Merchant Scroll hasn’t completely overtaken the Pauper metagame, but it’s nonetheless become more popular. Previously, players only needed a single copy for Vintage, but now playsets are on the table. This has created a general uptick in demand alongside the expected unban surge, resulting in a rather impressive price spike.
Obviously, since it’s legal in Pauper, Merchant Scroll has been printed at common before, but that doesn’t mean it’s everywhere. To date, this card has only been printed three times, and most of these printings are rather old. Not only does this mean that near-mint examples are rather scarce, but we’re also dealing with generally lower print volumes.
Curiously, despite these lower print volumes, the most accessible variant of Merchant Scroll has seen the biggest spike. Before the spike, the Mystery Booster 2 variant of Merchant Scroll was the most plentiful and the cheapest. Now, however, prices for this Future Sight frame card have shot up to around $10.69 as supply has dwindled.
Currently, on TCGplayer, there are only 29 near-mint copies of this Merchant Scroll variant available for purchase on TCGplayer. Notably, this is still far more than what’s available for the Homeland and 8th Edition copies of this card. Nevertheless, these older variants are still yet to see a major spike.
| Printing | Starting Price | Current Price | Percentage Increase |
| Homelands | $5.50 | $9.49 | 72% |
| 8th Edition | $4.51 | $8.80 | 95% |
| Mystery Booster 2 | $3.14 | $10.69 | 240% |
The Future
As usual, it’s rather difficult to tell exactly where the price of Merchant Scroll may end up when looking ahead. The final resting price of this card will ultimately depend on its competitive performance, after all. Should the archetype continue to do well in Pauper, interest and prices may increase over time.
Alternatively, should the Pauper metagame adapt and push the High Tide combo out, then Merchant Scroll’s price may fall. Admittedly, it seems rather unlikely that this will happen since the deck is rather resilient. Nevertheless, like all things in life, nothing is guaranteed about the price of Merchant Scroll. Alternatively, there is a real chance that High Tide will get re-banned since the two unbanned Pauper cards are being closely monitored.
That being said, this card will likely end up being more expensive than it used to be, simply because it’s playable in more places now. The price bump may not end up being massive when prices finally settle, but it’ll surely be something, at least. As always, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens, as we sadly can’t fully predict the future.
