On Monday, Wizards of the Coast launched the much-anticipated Hatsune Miku Commander precon to immense fanfare. While this precon couldn’t sell out, thanks to a switch to print-to-demand, the pre-printed supply lasted less than one hour. With demand this high, it’s no wonder this Secret Lair sale has impacted secondary market prices.
Curiously, rather than players hunting for powerful upgrades, judging by recent price spikes, it appears flavor has been the focus. Since the precon was fully revealed, multiple past Hatsune Miku Secret Lair cards have spiked dramatically in price. In particular, a past Secret Lair Commander Tower reprint has shot up to around $100 thanks to a surge in sales.
MTG Miku Commander Tower
Given that it sees play in over 7,120,000 Commander decks, according to EDHREC, Command Tower needs no introduction. In fact, this insane play rate makes it the second most popular card in Commander, appearing in 74% of all decks. Considering this card offers unrivaled free fixing for any non-monocolored Commander deck, this play rate isn’t even surprising.
Thanks to its usefulness, you can already find a copy of Command Tower in the Hatsune Miku precon decklist. This copy, however, is just a regular default frame copy that you’d find in any ol’ precon. While functional, there is a much more enticing Command Tower variant on offer in the Hatsune Miku: Digital Sensation Secret Lair drop.
Not only is this Hatsune Miku-themed reprint naturally more flavorful, but it’s also full art and textless. Thanks to this, it’s the perfect upgrade to the deck, which has resulted in a huge surge in demand, pushing prices up by 262%. While this Miku-themed card used to sell for just $28 after just 79 sales, prices have shot up to a cent shy of $100.
Unfortunately, even if you don’t care about card condition, there aren’t any worse examples at discounted prices. As if this didn’t make bling out your Miku precon expensive enough, plenty of other upgrades have also spiked significantly.
MTG Miku Sol Ring
Like Command Tower, the Hatsune Miku Secret Lair precon already contains a copy of Sol Ring. This isn’t surprising, given it’s an auto-include in every precon and basically every Commander deck. Once again, however, the copy in the precon by default is a boring default-frame example, but there is an alternative.
Alongside Command Tower in the Hatsune Miku: Digital Sensation drop, there’s also a Miku-themed Sol Ring. While this variant does still have text, it’s a huge flavor upgrade, especially for such an iconic MTG card. That said, it does come at an insane price tag thanks to the new sudden wave of demand.
Selling for around $53 back in July, this Sol Ring variant was never particularly cheap to begin with. This is thanks to annoyingly low supply, as the original Digital Sensation drop sold out almost instantly. Due to this, it’s only taken 67 near-mint sales to push new listings up to $136.50.
MTG Miku Harmonize
While it’s not in the Hatsune Miku Secret Lair precon by default, you can throw in a copy of Harmonize for even more Miku. Thanks to the Hatsune Miku: Sakura Superstar drop, this Commander staple also has a beloved Miku variant. As much as this can be a flavorful upgrade to the deck, you do have to cut something for it.
In theory, you could cut something like Shamanic Revelation, but that card is sadly just better. Even if it is more mana-intensive, it can provide far more card draw while also gaining you tons of life. Potentially, Idol of Oblivion could be a better cut, but even that can provide more long-term value.
Realistically, the only reason you’d run Harmonize in the Hatsune Miku Secret Lair precon is to have more Mikus in the 99. While this might not be the most effective strategy, given how much Harmonize has spiked in price, evidently players are keen. After just 60 near-mint sales, prices have jumped dramatically from around $18 to $64.
MTG Miku Chord of Calling
Curiously, despite being cheaper at the moment, at least, the Miku-themed Chord of Calling is a much better precon upgrade. While you’ll still have to cut something for it, this card having Convoke lets it do work in a token-oriented deck. Thanks to this, Chord of Calling is incredibly cost-effective, cheating in any major threat for just three mana.
Considering the Hatsune Miku precon has Vorinclex and Ghalta and Marven at the top end, Chord of Calling isn’t short on targets. Since running it lets you boost the deck’s Miku percentage as well, it’s a wonder this card hasn’t spiked a lot more. Currently, the past Miku-themed Secret Lair variant has only jumped 144% from around $19 to $47.
MTG Miku, Voice of Power
Like Harmonize, Miku, Voice of Power, or rather Freyalise, Llanowar’s Fury is a bit of a weird precon upgrade. Since this planeswalker produces tokens, it can provide decent value, but it’s hardly the fastest token generator. Still, since it has a Miku variant from the Hatsune Miku: Electric Entourage drop, you can force it in.
Thanks to this desire for more Miku, the price of this Secret Lair variant has jumped from $16 to $27. While this isn’t the steepest spike, it does still beat out the Miku variant of Shelter. Hailing from the Sakura Superstar drop, this protection piece has only jumped from $4 to $8 in price.
New Scarce Staples?
While predicting the future of MTG prices is always more art than science, these Miku-themed spikes are exceptionally abstract. In theory, this could easily follow the usual hype cycle of a precon, where early demand is astronomical, but that dies off fairly quickly. While we could see this trend happen again, this Secret Lair precon is a bit different.
Even though there was only a limited supply that had been pre-printed, the print-to-demand model means this deck isn’t done. In May of 2027, at the earliest, the second wave of supply will reach buyers, potentially triggering another secondary market demand wave. If this does happen, the spikes we’ve seen today could shoot up again to theoretically ridiculous highs.
As much as this could happen in theory, it’s unclear who has been buying up all of the recent copies. Naturally, there should be demand from players looking to upgrade their decks, but equally, investors could be the major driving force. If this is the case, then even when additional supply hits, players might not be that interested.
Ultimately, as always, we can only really wait to see what happens, since accurately predicting the future is impossible. Frustratingly, we’ve got a long wait until the future is realized, too, as we’ll have to wait for that second supply wave. Thankfully, we shouldn’t be bored in the interim, at least, as Wizards has been releasing new Secret Lair drops at a record pace.
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