volcanic island
8, Nov, 22

MTG's Best Lands Plummet By 50% Due to Player Outrage?

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Article at a Glance

It seems that panic behind the 30th Anniversary Edition has reared its ugly head again since early packs have been digested into the marketplace. One particular trait that these packs have is that Dual Lands are twice as common as is usually possible. For those not aware, Dual Lands are considered to be the best land cards that will ever be printed into Magic: the Gathering, and, according to The Reserved List, things are supposed to stay that way. This has resulted in this cycle of cards being worth hundreds of dollars on the secondary market for its cheapest printing – Revised. Well, the non-tournament legal reprintings of these cards have scared players witless. Everyone is selling, and players couldn’t be happier about it.

Revised Duals are Being Panic Sold on a Massive Scale

We have to admit this may be a little overdramatized by the MTG community. It’s not like a perspective Volcanic Island owner can take a jog down to their LGS and find one that’s magically under a hundred dollars. However, according to various voices in the MTG community, there is a consistent 10-15% drop on all Revised Dual Lands. Some comments, like the ones seen above, claim that it’s much higher than that. These are some of the most sought-after cards in the game, and MTG players are taking advantage of the lower prices En-Masse.

According to various YouTubers, this is a result of players being upset and scared of how the recent tournament-illegal Reserved List reprintings seen in the 30th Anniversary Edition will affect the secondary market. News started making their rounds when MTG YouTuber Alpha Investments made a video highlighting that buylists to various major LGS had seen a massive decline on the value of Revised Dual Lands. While prices have rebounded a bit since then, they are, according to numbers being reported by various community members, still down to a percentage relatively close to 50%. To reaffirm, these are buylist prices, not market costs of Dual Lands.

What Does the Damage Look Like?

Revisted Underground Sea TCGplayer Sales History
Revised Tundra TCGplayer Sales History

Underground Sea is the example being used by most players reporting the declining value of these pieces of MTG history. As can be seen by the graphs above, Underground Sea has been hit significantly harder than the rest of the Revised Dual Lands. The decline here is close to 50% of its value at its peak, but does quite hit the drastic drop seen in receny buylist prices. Sales dictate that NM copies of Underground Sea have already declined to about $700 on average (the sale pictured is higher than the average NM sale over time) and are slated to go even lower.

volcanic island

An exception to the rule seems to be Volcanic Island. Unlike the other Dual Lands, this card appears to be relatively unaffected by the recent dump of cards, only seeing about a $200 drop in the same timeframe that Underground Sea saw a $550 one. This may be due to a much heavier demand for the card since Legacy’s best and most-played deck plays four copies of it. That said, Volcanic Island is, at best, retaining its current value. Buylist patterns suggest a strong potential for this card to start dropping off. Whether it actually will or not is a different story.

Should You Sell Your Dual Lands?

tundra

There doesn’t seem to be a correct answer to this question. Some financial MTG players, terrified over the unified response that the 30th Anniversary Edition received from the community, are seeing these patterns and don’t want anything to do with them. That said, these are premium lands in Commander, the most played format in all of MTG, that cannot see functional tournament legal reprints according to The Reserved List. As showcased above, there is also a lot of interest in buying these Dual Lands at a lower bar-to-entry. For those reasons, unless you need the money soon, I would hold onto these. However, I will repeat that there really doesn’t seem to be a correct answer to this question, and some MTG Finance gurus do not think these Revised Duals will be regaining their previous value soon.

The unfortunate reality is that this tournament-illegal reprinting of Reserved List cards has, according to the MTG community, invalidated many things MTG creators have said in the past, and now players aren’t sure if the collapse of the Reserved List is on the horizon. If that does happen, Revised Dual Lands’ value will likely plummet, and selling them now would be the right choice. At the end of the day, Youtuber Alpha Investments, in their opinion, summarizes the change in the situation quite nicely:

“I think it’s important for people to understand that there’s no easy money in these old Magic cards anymore.”

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