MTG Prereleases, at least nowadays, tend to have a bunch of small bonuses. These are done to make Prerelease events feel more special, something many MTG players appreciate. One example of a recent, but consistent Prerelease promotion are the 30th Anniversary cards. While these promotional cards’ distribution is not precisely to everyone’s preference, they are still cool treats for many players at no additional cost. The same can be said for the Commander cards that caused some issues regarding Prerelease legality. That said, not all of these promotions are accessible to everyone, and scarcity in the MTG community tends to convert into dollar signs. This may be the case for some highly-lucrative Japanese-Exclusive MTG tokens from March of the Machine!
Japanese Tokens Created by Big Names
One Redditor who happened to pick up some March of the Machine product while in Japan took to Reddit after discovering a token they did not see during preview season. This token, with artistic credits to Daisuke Izuka, known for his outstanding artistic work for the Fire Emblem series, depicts a 1/1 Soldier creature token in an Anime style with a keyword. As we have seen from past Anime artwork promotions, especially regarding the Jumpstart 2022 set that released at the end of 2022, these artworks can multiply the price of an MTG card. Balan, Wandering Knight and Liliana, Dreadhorde General are fantastic examples of this put into action.
Redditor jkinpar, who discovered the Japanese token on his travels, wasn’t the only one that had never heard of this token before. The same went for, well, most non-Japanese MTG players. Thankfully, after some digging, another Redditor provided a link that may answer many questions that this beautiful Anime token brought up – namely – how the heck do non-Japanese players get these tokens!?
Exclusive Full-Art Anime Tokens
After some digging via Google Translate, it turns out that these tokens are part of a March of the Machine promotion exclusively in Japan. As mentioned by our traveling Redditor, this token was received in “a special pack.” These packs seem to be given out to players if they purchase “8 packs of March of the Machine Corps Set Booster purchased at participating stores.” According to the translated material, all these tokens are plastic and may have foil, nonfoil, and an “even lower probability that a token with a special specification will appear…?”
Here are all six new Japanese-exclusive plastic tokens available as a part of this promotion:
An Anime-style Monastery Mentor Monk token by Rorubei
The soldier token that started this entire conversation (I’m assuming it has Lifelink since March of the Machine tokens care about that)
A 2/2 Knight token with, what I’m assuming is Vigilance
A standard 2/2 Zombie
This appears to be a 1/1 Thopter token created by the Invasion of Kaladesh.
The six tokens are, ironically, completed by what looks to be the same Dinosaur token created by Ghalta and Mavren that is missing Trample.
Read More: Breakout MTG Foil Card Approaches $100!
How Much Are They Worth?
Many Redditors, upon the reveal of this token, were incredibly excited about what the artwork, and the artist, had to offer for MTG:
“Goddamn, thats a lot of big name artists.
Daisuke Izuka and Lack proving again why they’re incredible.Also, funny note that most of these illustrators make some incredible card art for Cardfight Vanguard on the regular.”
Manrann
“Japan has alot of exclusive tokens they are actually worth something in the states”
Hwxnxtzero10
“Wow! They actually commissioned a Fire Emblem artist?! This is way too cool. Gotta find one for myself!”
Laetteralus
As mentioned by many Redditors, even though these promotional tokens are free in Japan, they do have a financial value in the U.S. One Redditor mentions that he found a Monk token on eBay for about $15, but when looking into these tokens for ourselves, we only found one full set of nonfoil tokens posted for about $170. If the Redditor’s claims are true, this is likely overpriced. For the time being, we were unable to find these on TCGplayer.
We did, however, find these sold on hareruyamtg.com. All of Japan’s exclusive plastic tokens list for between 200 and 5000 Yen. For reference, this is equivalent to a bit over an American dollar and slightly under $40. Obviously, the foil plastic tokens tend to be worth more than the nonfoil ones, and the foil Knight token from March of the Machine seems to be worth the most. Many of these cards are currently sold out, and we did not find the ‘special treatment’ mentioned in Wizards of the Coast’s translated material detailing the tokens.
Are There More Region-Specific Promotions?
While there is no official reason for these excellent promotions being region-exclusive, many Redditors mention that the TCG market in Japan is much more competitive than the rest of the world:
“Other Tcgs are a lot more popular in Japan so mtg has more competition. As a result they do more promos to help generate sales.”
frozensun516
If the interest in the Anime tokens is large enough, Wizards of the Coast may also make these tokens easier to access for American players. Jumpstart 2022 should have been a massive indicator that Anime art is something that the MTG community is interested in, so there could be some potential that we see this in an easier-to-access way in the future. I, personally, am putting some Monastery Mentors in my Commander decks thanks to March of the Machine, and I’m already interested in picking up a few of these Monk tokens for myself. There are many MTG players who have already indicated their interest in stuff like this.
Read More: MTG Surprises Players With Good News About Bonus Sheets
