At this point, it’s no secret that MTG players have a favorite out of the Secrets of Strixhaven precons. Given the sheer number of price spikes it has caused, players seemingly can’t get enough of Silverquill Influence. While this deck does have a unique and powerful strategy, it’s hardly the only Secrets of Strixhaven precon that’s worthy of attention.
The Quandrix Unlimited deck, for instance, equally offers a very compelling and surprisingly rarely supported game plan. Despite this, the deck has gotten surprisingly little love, with only a handful of Warhammer 40,000 cards climbing in price. Now, following this deck’s official release last Friday, we can add another card to that curiously specific pile.
MTG Nexos
After just one look, it’s easy to see why the Quandrix Unlimited deck wants Nexos. This MTG precon revolves around X cost spells, and Nexos provides an insane amount of fuel for that strategy. Essentially, for two mana, you get to double the mana that all of your lands produce, which is just absurd.
Thanks to this ability, it’s little wonder that Nexos has seen a significant boost in play recently. According to EDHREC, over 775 new decks are using Nexos between Zimone and Primo. While this is a decent jump in play rate for a somewhat scarce Warhammer 40,000 card, Nexos was already fairly popular.
Alongside naturally being great in its home precon, Tyranid Swarm, Nexos also works wonders with Zaxara, the Exemplary. Realistically, any Commander deck that leans on X cost cards can utilize this Tyranid. This has caused Nexos to see play in around 28,000 MTG Commander decks, and that number is only growing with time.
Curiously, while X cost-focused cards aren’t the most common in MTG, they’re not entirely unheard of either. An entire precon built around the concept is definitely unusual, but we do occasionally get individual legends like The Goose Mother. While this could give Nexos long-term potential, it’s already proving it’s got the recipe for financial success right now.
The Spike
Ever since the face Commanders for the Secrets of Strixhaven precons were revealed, Nexos has been climbing in price. This happened all the way back in late January and caused an immediate surge in sales, despite the possibility of reprints. While demand did die out fairly quickly, following the full reveal of each deck, sales picked back up again.
In the past three months, 450 near-mint copies of Nexos have been sold so far. This has pushed prices up considerably, with near-mint examples now starting at $13.91. While this is over the current market price, sales have peaked at $17.49, so clearly players aren’t afraid to spend.
Prior to this spike, Nexos was a fairly affordable MTG card. Routinely selling for around $3, you could even pick up copies for $3.62 as the spike started. Sadly, copies at or near this price point are long gone now, as copies in worse condition have also spiked. At best, the cheapest you’ll find a copy of Nexos for right now is $13.84, and that’s for a lightly played example.
Unfortunately, like most Warhammer 40,000 MTG cards, the only other variant of Nexos is the surge foil printing. Thanks to its innate rarity, these copies now start at just under $20, and sales have peaked at $25. While this is already a pretty penny, in theory, this could just be the start of what’s to come.
The Almost Reserved List?
Even though X cost-focused decks aren’t the most popular archetype in Commander, Nexos could easily remain fairly expensive. As new cards and support get printed, this card’s price could even continue to climb in the coming years. This hypothetical climb might not be linear, as demand ebbs and flows, but Nexos does have rarity on its side.
Thanks to being printed in the Warhammer 40,000 precons with the unique Tyranid type, Nexos is a tricky one to reprint. Technically, a reprint isn’t impossible; however, reprint sources are largely limited to precons and bonus sheets nowadays. While there’s nothing stopping Universes Beyond cards from appearing on either of these, so far, Wizards has only reprinted safe options.
With this in mind, it does feel that Nexos, and many similar Universes Beyond cards, are on a faux Reserved List right now. Until WotC proves reprints of these cards are possible, Nexos has added financial security right now. If this never changes, the card could easily get more and more expensive in time, since it’s so good in X cost decks.
Ultimately, while it does feel that Nexos is safe for now, this could change fairly easily. Whether or not this will actually end up happening, however, remains to be seen. For now, we’ll just have to wait patiently and see where this card’s price goes in the coming months.
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