The MTG Marvel Secret Lair Superdrop just keeps on giving, it seems. The tumultuous sale may have started, and ended, on Monday, but it hasn’t stopped dominating headlines. On top of the obvious controversy and problems, there have also been myriad price spikes, and now brand-new bonus cards!
Revealed thanks to remarkably early Secret Lair deliveries, we already know that the new bonus cards are themed around Groot. They might not have gotten their own Secret Lair, but with five flavorful bonus cards, they’re still well-represented. Well, five bonus cards was the expectation at first, but it now seems we’re getting more.
Contrary to initial expectations, it seems the new Groot-themed bonus cards aren’t guaranteed fixed inclusions. Instead, thanks to a new reveal, it seems players may be able to get lucky and find an ultra-rare renamed reprint. Exactly how rare this new card is remains to be seen, but it’s nonetheless seriously exciting.
Abundant Groot
Technically, Abundant Growth is not a very good reprint in the grand scheme of MTG. It’s not a terrible card by any means, as it’s fixing that replaces itself, but it’s not massively exciting either. If you’re after fixing or ramp in Commander, there are a lot better options, so Abundant Growth is often overlooked.
Thanks to it being fairly weak, and a range of past reprints, Abundant Growth also isn’t expensive. On TCGplayer, you can pick up copies for around $0.11, so it’s firmly in the draft chaff category. Despite this rather pitiful price tag, this new bonus card is still very much worth getting excited about.
They might technically be the same card, but Abundant Groot is worlds apart from Abundant Growth. At least in terms of desirability, this new bonus card is simply on another level entirely. For starters, it’s a Marvel crossover MTG card, so it’s bound to hold a premium over past printings. On top of that, this bonus card could, in theory, being seriously hard to get ahold of.
This latter point is practically guaranteed to be true, given how quickly the Marvel Secret Lair cards sold out. There’s clearly a fervenent appetite for Marvel crossover MTG cards, so demand will likely be through the roof. Between low supply, players not wanting to sell, and insane demand, there’s no chance Abundant Groot isn’t expensive.
A Terribly Expensive Trio?
As if a high price wasn’t already practically guaranteed, Abundant Groot isn’t a guaranteed bonus card. Right now, it’s unclear how often they’ll appear, but it seems likely that they’ll be somewhat harder to find. Since the other five Groots all feature art themed around a dedicated drop, it would be weird for Abundant Groot to routinely replace them.
With this in mind, there’s a non-zero chance that Abundant Groot is an ultra-rare bonus card. Only appearing once in a blue moon, copies of this card could be incredibly scarce, and subsequently obsecnely expensive. Exactly how expensive they’ll end up being is unclear, but past ultra-rare bonus cards have gone for over $300!
As if Abundant Groot wasn’t exciting enough on their own as a bonus card, their collector number is highly intriguing. As Genobyl noted on Reddit, a collector number of 870 indicates there are two as-yet-unseen bonus cards out there somewhere. For reference, the original five themed Groots have collector numbers from 863 to 867.
Sadly, there’s no telling what these mysterious missing bonus cards might be for now. Given what we’ve seen so far, it’s sensible to expect more Groot, but exact reprints are a complete mystery. There’s also no telling how rare each of the missing bonus cards will be, or if there are any more beyond 870.
Ultimately, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens, for now. Only once more deliveries are made and packages opened, we should have a better idea about rarities and what’s been reprinted.