Just as many MTG players had hoped, Lorwyn Eclipsed felt like a true blast from the past. With classic creature types, iconic legends, and the plane’s high-fantasy wackiness all returning, this set is already beloved. Beyond just being a huge flavor win, the new and old mechanics in Lorwyn Eclipsed were also huge hits.
In Commander, the -1/-1 Counter support, and typal themes of Lorwyn Eclipsed have been consistently moving the markets. Elementals, Elves, and Faeries, in particular, have all been big business as of late. Now, it seems it’s finally time for Kithkin to have their moment in the spotlight, as Kinsbaile Borderguard has spiked significantly in price.
MTG Kinsbaile Borderguard
For better or worse, Kinsbaile Borderguard is a Kithkin Typal card through and through. Offering two synergistic abilities, both of these lean on existing Kithkin synergies in your deck to extract value. While this does technically make Kinsbaile Borderguard somewhat weak on its own, the same is true for a lot of typal-focused cards.
Thankfully, since there are plenty of Kithkin lords like Kinsbaile Cavalier and Wizened Cenn, it’s easy to create a scary board. This is especially true with Kinsbaile Borderguard in hand, since a fair few cards can create Kithkin tokens. Alongside a card like Patrol Signaler, for instance, building a board is trivial, allowing Kinsbaile Borderguard to have maximum impact.
While the floor might be rather low for Kinsbaile Borderguard, the ceiling is massive. For three mana, you can realistically get a huge threat that creates an instant board after eating removal. There’s even an infinite combo using Antler Skulkin and Ashnod’s Altar to abuse Persist for infinite 1/1 Kithkin tokens.
Despite this potential, Kithkin Typal isn’t the most popular archetype, as it rarely gets support from Wizards. Due to this, Kinsbaile Borderguard was only played in around 650 decks until Lorwyn Eclipsed came along. Now, thanks to Brigid, Clachan’s Heart there’s been a huge surge in Kithkin Typal’s popularity.
According to EDHREC, over 900 new Brigid Commander decks are running a copy of Kinsbaile Borderguard. This has over doubled the past play rate, unsurprisingly resulting in a substantial spike in demand. As usual, this has also caused an impressive price spike, especially since copies of Kinsbaile Borderguard aren’t too common.
The Spike
Thanks to being printed exclusively in Morningtide, Kinsbaile Borderguard is fairly rare. Near-mint condition copies, in particular, are especially scarce thanks to the card being over 18 years old. Due to this, it only took 50 near-mint non-foil sales in the past month to buy out all but four copies of Kinsbaile Borderguard.
Technically, these near-mint copies are now selling for $14.23, including shipping. Considering copies in this condition used to be worth just $1.01, that would mark a 1308% price spike. Realistically, though, while new listings are very expensive, the highest recorded near-mint sale so far is just $9.09.
Thanks to the increased availability, lightly-played copies of Kinsbaile Borderguard show a much more realistic price progression. Over the past few weeks, sales have been somewhat steady, specifically picking up after Lorwyn Eclipsed became legal. Previously, copies in this condition were selling for $0.79, but now they’re going for $6.98.
Mercifully, while prices are up across the board, worse condition copies are still slightly cheaper at the moment. Moderately played examples, for instance, can be had for just $4.04 right now. Sadly, with no reprints or any alternative art variants, this is now the minimum price for a copy of Kinsbaile Borderguard.
A Suspect Staple
In theory, Kinsbaile Borderguard is a true staple within the Kithkin Typal archetype. The trouble is that this is a very niche archetype with rather limited support. Since this beloved creature type is only really found on Lorwyn, we rarely get new Kithkin cards.
With this in mind, it feels inevitable that the current hype around Kithkin Typal will end up fading away throughout 2026. This might not happen immediately, but it’s hard to deny that this year is stacked with content. Between Secrets of Strixhaven, Marvel Super Heroes, Reality Fracture, and The Hobbit, we’re getting tons of new cards.
As these are released, new preconstructed decks, especially, there’s a good chance that Kithkin will fade back into obscurity. If this happens, the price of Kinsbaile Borderguard should fall, although likely not to previous lows. Instead, since recently bought copies don’t always return to the secondary market, the price could retain a slight premium here on out.
Ultimately, as always, while there is a trend of Commander-based price spikes falling over time, nothing in MTG is guaranteed. As such, we’ll just have to wait and see what happens in the coming weeks and months.
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