Gruul War Plow is seeing a price spike, and we were stumped as to why for a long time. It’s evident that Commander is the cause of a card like this going up in price, but even then, what Commanders want this? Well, there are two likely candidates that caused Gruul War Plow to see some attention, and we’ll discuss the card from that perspective.
Gruul War Plow
A few MTG Commanders who are becoming more popular are interested in Gruul War Plow. Four mana is rather expensive for a card that grants your creatures Trample, but some Commanders want this ability badly enough to warrant playing it. Combine this with the fact that Gruul War Plow only has one printing, and the perfect price spike storm brews.
Before getting into the Commanders in question, it should be noted that Gruul War Plow is still seeing 0% of play, according to EDHREC. This doesn’t literally mean that no one is playing the card, but it does mean that this card is incredibly unpopular in the Commander format. From this perspective, Gruul War Plow might be a genuine diamond in the rough.
The Commander who seems to want this card the most is Bello, Bard of the Brambles. The 3-mana raccoon is one of the preconstructed Commanders from Bloomburrow. Because the preconstructed deck gives players a good base to build their face Commanders, these are typically very popular.
Bello turns your noncreature artifacts with mana value four or greater into indestructible 4/4s. Those creatures also draw a card for you when dealing damage, which makes Trample very valuable. Gruul War Plow, then, becomes a 4/4 without using its ability, is indestructible, and draws you cards too. With this in mind, the card actually seems quite powerful in Bello, Bard of Brambles.
The other popular Commander that may want this card is Wolverine, Best There Is. This particular MTG card represents a beloved Marvel hero, which means that many fans will want to run the card in Commander. Wolverine wants to get in scraps. Thanks to innate Regeneration and his ability to deal double damage, he’ll be winning most of the fights that you pick with him.
This means that your Commander strategy with Wolverine likely involves Voltron elements. In other words, you want to deal 21 Commander damage with Wolverine to knock people out. Unfortunately, Wolverine does not have a Trample, which allows your opponent to block him with tiny creatures to avoid damage. Gruul War Plow solves this problem.
Another honorable mention to an unpopular Commander who wants this card is Stonebrow, Krosan Hero. That card only buffs creatures with Trample – a problem that Gruul War Plow solves.
The Spike
The graph above from TCGplayer showcases the impressive rise of Gruul War Plow over the last three months. Notably, this graph only takes near-mint copies of the card into account. Basically, the card has jumped from 50 cents to $2 in this time. Copies of near-mint Gruul War Plow are selling for as much as $3.
Gruul War Plow is a surprisingly old card. The only copy of this card was printed 18 years ago. As a result, there are a lot of damaged and heavily played copies on the secondary market. If you’re willing to use a Gruul War Plow that’s been loved, you can save some money. Heavily played War Plows commonly go for about 50 cents.
For what it’s worth, foils don’t seem to have a massive multiplier for this card. Considering how old this card is, that’s rather surprising. $1.20-3 is a decent price for a foil Gruul War Plow. If this card does take off in popularity, foils are likely to get expensive quickly.
Gruul War Plow certainly isn’t for everyone, but there isn’t a lot of them to go around, either. While the card is spiking in price for now, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Plow just plummets at some point. The card is incredibly niche. I cannot imagine the demand for it is really all that high.
