To put it lightly, the spoiler season for MTG Foundations has been incredibly full-on. Not only did it kick off with an almighty bang at MagicCon: Las Vegas, but Wizards hasn’t slowed down since. This is hardly a surprise when you remember that MTG Foundations is three products in one.
Not only is Foundations a massive new main set but there’s also Foundations Jumpstart and the Starter Collection. Thanks to this, it’s been wall-to-wall spoilers and reveals since Wizards started spoiler season in earnest. While this is all very exciting, unfortunately, it has made it somewhat challenging to keep up with everything.
Amidst the slew of exciting new spoilers and immensely powerful mythic cards, reprints can often fall by the wayside. With this in mind, you may have missed the recently revealed Special Guests for Foundations. Unveiled during the latest Weekly MTG livestream, these reprints come from across the multiverse and offer seriously exciting value.
A Terrific Trio
To kick off this breakdown of the Foundations Special Guests, let’s start with the best of the best: Akroma’s Memorial. This seven-mana artifact isn’t cheap, in every sense of the word, but it’s very much worth it. Akroma’s Memorial can make any board incredibly threatening by providing seven valuable abilities to all your creatures. Even if you’re not playing against black or red, this card is still well worth the price.
Speaking of price, Akroma’s Memorial currently costs around $30 on TCGplayer. For better or worse, it’s unlikely the new Special Guests variant will sell for too much more. Currently, the Secret Lair variant of Akroma’s Memorial sells for around $33, so that may be the price ceiling. Even if that is the maximum price, it’ll be one hell of a pull from MTG Foundations boosters.
Following on from Akroma’s Memorial, Grim Tutor is the next most expensive Foundations Special Guest. Selling for around $20 this card is another Commander darling that’s immensely popular in the format. Once again, the new Kaldheim-flavored art could push the price up even more, but Secret Lair variants only cost $18.
Last but not least for the seriously spicy Special Guests, we have Bloom Tender, which is only worth around $16. Despite being the cheapest of the good cards, this is still a fantastic reprint to see. Offering incredible ramp for multicolored Commander decks, five-color in particular, Bloom Tender is a true Commander staple.
Mid Mids
Technically, Temporal Manipulation is the next most valuable Special Guest card from Foundations… Some of the time, at least. Thanks to the new Mystery Booster 2 reprint, this card is now selling for as low as $6 on TCGplayer. Old variants of the card, however, such as the Ultimate Masters variant, are $15 a pop. Secret Lair and borderless variants sell for even more, upwards of $20, so the price of this new reprint could land anywhere.
Even if it’s not quite as valuable as past highs, Temporal Manipulation will still be a good card to find in a Foundations booster. The same is true of Embercleave, which sells for around $7 most of the time. Once a Standard staple, this card now only really sees play in Commander. While this has obviously affected the card’s price, it’s still a popular and powerful equipment piece.
Last up in the somewhat decent midrange, we have the unusual tutor that is Fiend Artisan. While they’re hardly the most powerful card in Magic, Fiend Artisan can do a lot between sacrificing, growing, and tutoring. Since each of these abilities works harmoniously with one another, they’re a decent addition to a fair few decks.
Regarding price, Fiend Artisan is another oddball since they’ve only had one non-premium printing. Appearing as a Mythic in Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths, there’s not much supply for this card available. Potentially, this could cause the new Special Guest printing to bring the cost down a touch, but that remains to be seen. At the moment, the card goes for between $5 and $10 depending on the variant.
The Duds
As always, not every new Special Guest card is an absolute winner. That said, not every card has to be a winner purely from a value perspective. Reckless Bushwhacker may be a $0.30 card, but it’s nonetheless a great Special Guest. This is thanks to the fact that Special Guest cards come to MTG Arena.
Currently, Reckless Bushwhacker is a popular choice for Atarka Red decks in Pioneer, thanks to their aggressive prowess. Since they’re not in Explorer currently, this makes them a great addition to the client. Sure, Pioneer Masters might be on the horizon, but it’s still nice to get this card a little early.
Technically, both Sphinx’s Tutelage and Condemn are also new to Arena reprints, but these cards are hardly competitive staples. Both cards are only really played in Commander, and neither of them sees a great deal of play. As a result, the price of both of these cards is relatively low. Sphinx’s Tutelage is just under a dollar, while Condemn is only worth a few cents.
Last but not least, Paradise Druid rounds out this new collection of Special Guests for Foundations with a resounding meh. As much as Paradise Druid may be a very capable mana dork, this card has been reprinted time and time again. Until now, it has been lacking a stunning showcase frame variant, but who knows if the new Ravnica-inspired artwork is fancy enough.
A Silver Lining
At the end of the day, the Special Guests for Foundations should provide some enjoyable extra spice to the pack opening experience. On MTG Arena, the new cards should be a nice treat too, but there is one persistent problem. While it doesn’t matter so much on paper, on Arena, each Special Guest is mythic rarity.
This has long made crafting Special Guest cards incredibly frustrating. Rather than being able to use an uncommon Wildcard on Restless Bushwhacker, you’re forced to expend a mythic Wildcard instead. Considering how coveted mythic Wildcards tend to be, this obviously doesn’t feel nice to do.
Thankfully, it seems Wizards of the Coast may finally fix this problem. In a Reddit thread devoted to the new Special Guests, MTG Arena Developer WotC_Jay revealed that changes are in the works. While it’s unclear what’s being planned, we should find out next week.
“We discuss this in next week’s State of the Game article, but, spoiler alert, the rarity shifts here shouldn’t be an issue for most players starting with the Foundations release”
WotC_Jay
To make a realistic guess, it’s possible that the original printing of cards will now arrive alongside the Special Guest variant. This would allow players to use their Wildcards appropriately while potentially purchasing the new art.
Unrealistically, we’d like to think this message from WotC_Jay hints toward a major economic overhaul for MTG Arena. Considering MTG Foundations is on the horizon, now would be the perfect time to implement a new and improved system. Wishfully, this would be a deeper crafting system that allows players to dust cards, like in Hearthstone.
Sadly, the former of these scenarios is much more likely than the latter. Even this, however, is unconfirmed, as there’s no telling what Wizards will do. We’ll just have to wait until next week to find out what the State of the Game article has in store.
