When the meta breakdown for the MTG World Championship 31 was revealed, the meta looked surprisingly healthy. Considering Standard has been struggling for a long while, this change was definitely a breath of fresh air. For once, there wasn’t a massively dominant deck that had players immediately calling for bans.
Now that the tournament is all said and done, however, the format’s future doesn’t look so bright. Between Izzet Looting and Lesson decks, this color pair is once again back on top. It’s still early days, but it looks like bans might be back on the menu if Lorwyn Eclipsed doesn’t fix things. Until this happens, however, there’s been a huge rush of demand to jump aboard the new best deck in Standard.
MTG Stormchaser’s Talent
Released back in Bloomburrow, this is hardly the first time that Stormchaser’s Talent has been popular in Standard. Around this time last year, in fact, this card had a similar, albeit less significant price spike, thanks to its Standard success. Appearing in the Temur Prowess combo deck, alongside Valley Floodcaller and Enduring Vitality, this deck broke out in a big way.
While Temur Prowess, later coined Temur Otters, has stuck around, Stormchaser’s Talent hasn’t seen oodles of play outside of Standard. There are some Izzet Prowess decks in Pioneer using it, but it’s by no means a multiformat staple. Even in Commander, only around 24,000 decks are using it, which is low by today’s standards.
All of that said, Stormchaser’s Talent has recently exploded in popularity within MTG Standard. With multiple top-tier decks needing this card, the demand for it has reached a new all-time high. This is entirely unsurprising, as the value it offers all the decks it’s included in is fantastic.
For starters, getting a 1/1 Otter token with Prowess for just one mana gives these Izzet spellslinging decks a cheap threat. If this is all Stormchaser’s Talent does in a game, it’ll still be more than worthwhile, as this Otter can dish out massive damage. If you’ve got mana to spare, however, the second and third levels offer incredible utility.
Should you manage to get Stormchaser’s Talent to level three, the game is basically over unless it’s dealt with. Even before that happens, however, this Talent isn’t to be underestimated, especially since bouncing it is trivial. With Boomerang Basics running amok in Standard, too, getting an army of otters to overrun opponents is easy.
The Spike
Curiously, despite being a core component within many decks after Vivi left the format, Stormchaser’s Talent isn’t actually that expensive in MTG Standard. This time last month, for instance, near-mint non-foil copies of this card were selling for around $1.66 on average. Sales at this price were fairly consistent, but slow demand like this left tons of copies on the market.
Following the card’s resurgence in Standard, however, this price has shot up, as have the daily sales. Previously, between 10 and 30 copies of Stormchaser’s Talent would be sold on a good day. In the past few days, however, over 240 copies have been sold, leaving the market with little available supply.
At the moment, there are only 35 listings for near-mint non-foil copies of Stormchaser’s Talent on TCGplayer. Prices for these copies currently start at $18.15, which is even higher than the market price average. While this is already definitely expensive, some copies have sold for $27.99, thanks to TCGplayer Direct.
Thanks to this incredible surge in demand, the price of Stormchaser’s Talent has spiked by 993% in just one month. Much like the spike to Artist’s Talent, which also exploded in price recently, this is largely due to supply problems. Unlike many modern-day rare cards, Stormchaser’s Talent doesn’t have any alternative art variants to potentially boost supply.
Due to this, the few Commander players, and many competitive ones, are all after the same limited supply. This has made the card somewhat vulnerable to surges in demand, as we’re seeing now. Thankfully, while things are very expensive now, it doesn’t mean they’ll always be that way.
Rise and Fall
Typically, we can expect an explosive price spike, like the one Stormchaser’s Talent is seeing, to settle down after a few months. Low supply cards like this are quick to peak, but unless there’s long-term Commander demand, prices do fall eventually. Admittedly, we can’t predict the future to guarantee this, but Stormchaser’s Talent has spiked before last year.
Back in Temur Prowess/Otters was a big deal, Stormchaser’s Talent spiked up to around $14 in price. After a brief dip, the card would then spike again, hitting a peak of $20 before settling back down. As if one spike wasn’t enough, Stormchaser’s Talent bounced back following the release of Tarkir Dragonstorm, which gave us Cori-Steel Cutter.
While these successive spikes show us that Stormchaser’s Talent can definitely be an expensive MTG card, it’s hardly a sure thing. After each spike, the price of Stormchaser’s Talent was quick to fall, returning to around $10 while it was playable. In theory, this could be the final resting price for the card now, so long as more bans don’t hinder its playability.
Ultimately, it’s currently unclear which direction Stormchaser’s Talent and Izzet Lessons will go in. Should this deck continue to perform, demand may well rise and push the current price even further. Alternatively, if this deck is too strong, the threat of bans may actually bring the price down somewhat. As always, we’ll just have to wait and see what will happen.
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