Obscure MTG Planeswalker Triples in Price After Overnight Buyout

Thanks to Reality Fracture’s focus on Planeswalkers, Superfriends strategies are seeing a major upgrade across Commander. Whether its new support for the archetype, or new Commanders to rally behind, Superfriends are now more popular than ever.

While this has caused a fair few Superfriends cards to spike in recent days, most of these prices adjustments have come and gone, making this late price spike rather strange. After a massive buyout, Vronos, Masked Inquisitor has tripled in price in just a few days, but buyer beware, the demand might be artificial.

MTG Vronos, Masked Inquisitor

As far as Superfriends support goes, Vronos, Masked Inquisitor Vronos, Masked Inquisitor +1: Up to two other target planeswalkers you control phase out at the beginning of the next end step. (Treat them and anything attached to them as though they don't exist until your next turn.)
−2: For each opponent, return up to one target nonland permanent that player controls to its owner's hand.
−7: Target artifact you control becomes a 9/9 Construct artifact creature and gains vigilance, indestructible, and "This creature can't be blocked." isn’t among the absolute best, but it is interesting. Phasing Out your high-priority Planeswalkers can protect them from getting attacked by creatures or being targeted by removal, helping them safely tick up to their Ultimates.

Even if you aren’t working towards an Ultimate on something like Ugin, The Spirit Dragon Ugin, The Spirit Dragon +2: Ugin deals 3 damage to any target.
−X: Exile each permanent with mana value X or less that's one or more colors.
−10: You gain 7 life, draw seven cards, then put up to seven permanent cards from your hand onto the battlefield. , protecting controlling Planeswalkers like Oko, Thief of Crowns Oko, Thief of Crowns +2: Create a Food token. (It's an artifact with "{2}, {T}, Sacrifice this token: You gain 3 life.")
+1: Target artifact or creature loses all abilities and becomes a green Elk creature with base power and toughness 3/3.
−5: Exchange control of target artifact or creature you control and target creature an opponent controls with power 3 or less. or Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker +3: Destroy target noncreature permanent.
−2: Gain control of target creature.
−9: Nicol Bolas deals 7 damage to target player or planeswalker. That player or that planeswalker's controller discards seven cards, then sacrifices seven permanents of their choice. can also be a game-winning play.

In exchange, however, Vronos’s other abilities aren’t very interesting. The bounce effect can come in clutch in a pinch, buying you some time, but it’s not a core attraction to playing this card. Alternatively, Vronos’s Ultimate is rather easy to achieve, turning a redundant mana rock into a chunky threat. It’s a bit underwhelming as far as Planeswalker Ultimates go, but its ease of access is a point in its favor.

With all this in mind, the Phasing Out ability is the most interesting thing going for Vronos, making it rather popular in Superfriends decks. According to EDHREC, Vronos sees play in over 21,000 decks, with Commodore Guff Commodore Guff At the beginning of your end step, put a loyalty counter on another target planeswalker you control.
+1: Create a 1/1 red Wizard creature token with "{T}: Add {R}. Spend this mana only to cast a planeswalker spell."
−3: You draw X cards and Commodore Guff deals X damage to each opponent, where X is the number of planeswalkers you control.
Commodore Guff can be your commander. being the most popular home for the mysterious Planeswalker. Vronos also commonly appears in other strong Superfriends Commander decks, including Nicol Bolas, the Ravager Nicol Bolas, the Ravager Flying
When Nicol Bolas enters, each opponent discards a card.
{4}{U}{B}{R}: Exile Nicol Bolas, then return him to the battlefield transformed under his owner's control. Activate only as a sorcery. , Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice Atraxa, Praetors’ Voice Flying, vigilance, deathtouch, lifelink
At the beginning of your end step, proliferate. (Choose any number of permanents and/or players, then give each another counter of each kind already there.) , and The Prismatic Bridge The Prismatic Bridge Vigilance
{T}: Add one mana of any color.
Other legendary creatures you control have vigilance and "{T}: Add one mana of any color." .

Of course, Vronos is also seeing some play with the new Reality Fracture Planeswalker Typal Commanders. Tam, the Possibility Tam, the Possibility Planeswalker spells you cast cost {1} less to cast.
{W}{U}{B}{R}{G}, {T}: Proliferate X times, where X is the number of planeswalker types among planeswalkers you control. (To proliferate, choose any number of permanents and/or players, then give each another counter of each kind already there.) is, by far, the most popular of these, with Vronos appearing in over 1000 decks. Considering that Tam’s Proliferate effect is designed to build up towards Planeswalker Ultimates, Vronos’s Phasing Out ability suits the new Commander perfectly.

Vronos also appears in Jace, Multiverse Architect Jace, Multiverse Architect At the beginning of combat on each opponent's turn, they may pay {2}. If they don't, creatures they control can't attack Jaces you control this turn.
+1: Draw two cards, then put a card from your hand on the bottom of your library.
−3: Exile another target planeswalker or creature you control. Reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal a creature or planeswalker card. Put that card onto the battlefield and the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.
Jace, Multiverse Architect can be your commander. decks, but Jace’s static ability already makes your Planeswalkers harder to attack, making Vronos a bit less interesting.

The Spike

Unlike most of the MTG Superfriends cards that spiked already, Vronos, Masked Inquisitor saw a massive demand spike quite late. 320 near mint copies of the ‘Walker sold October 5th, but a vast majority of those sales were from one massive order. Now, supply for Vronos has been absolutely devastated, with only 24 listings left on TCGplayer.

With so little supply available, Vronos’s secondary market value shot up over a two-day period, with $9.99 now being the cheapest copy near mint copy available on TCGplayer. That means Vronos’s price tripled from its previous $2.98 low in August.

If you’re interested in grabbing a copy of Vronos and condition isn’t a concern, lightly played copies are available for quite a discount, starting at $4.80, but this may not last long. Even these copies are already showing signs of spiking towards $8 after shipping, at which point there won’t be any decent deals left.

Notably, Vronos only has one variant, appearing solely in Commanders Masters’ Planeswalker Party precon. Because of this, Vronos doesn’t even have a foil variant.

Buyer Beware

While Vronos, Masked Inquisitor is a decent addition to MTG Superfriends decks, this current price spike appears to be artificial. Notably, 297 copies of Vronos were sold in one order on TCGplayer, strongly suggesting that this spike is an investor-based one. While interest in Vronos has upticked after the sale, it means the vast majority of this card’s appeal is basically fake.

With one order for an absolutely ridiculous number of copies of Vronos, these cards will likely return to the marketplace before long, listed at quite a markup from the original price. In the likely event that demand for Vronos is far lower than it currently appears, these are unlikely to sell, causing copies to drop in price. For this reason, buying Vronos at an elevated price tag, especially if you have some time to wait, is probably a bad idea.

All of that said, however, MTG is impossible to predict, as anything can realistically happen. This sudden buyout could be the spotlight that Vronos needed to be noticed as a Superfriends asset, after all. While a long term price increase for Vronos seems extremely unlikely, only time will tell what will happen with this Planeswalker.

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