It’s no secret that the new Edge of Eternities Commander decks are causing quite a stir. Thanks to supporting unusual archetypes and having combo potential, we’ve seen a variety of price spikes since their reveals. As usual, the biggest of these spikes are typically found on decades-old cards that haven’t seen play in ages.
With ten days until the new precons are released, it’s no surprise that the markets haven’t stopped moving yet. Most recently, a pretty meh 28-year-old card from Visions is the latest to jump in price. While the percentage increase might not be the most stellar, this card is up over $30 this month alone.
Squandered Resources
At its core, Squandered Resources looks like an awful MTG card. For the low, low cost of two mana, you get to sacrifice your lands instead of tapping them normally. While you can tap lands for mana first before sacrificing them, doubling the mana you make for one turn is massively risky. That said, some decks can take advantage of this dubious ability.
In the eyes of sacrifice-themed decks, land-sacrifice decks, especially, Squandered Resources is a surprising value engine. At the very least, you have a consistent way to sacrifice the lands you control to generate additional value. This can work wonders with Szarel, Genesis Shepherd from the new World Shaper precon.
Squandered Resources will also work well with a fully Stationed Hearthhull, the Worldseed. So long as you have a way to bring back or replay lands from the graveyard, this synergy can be rather dangerous. That said, Hearthhull does already come with a sacrifice effect attached, as do many sacrifice-themed cards.
The Necrobloom, Lord Windgrace, and The Gitrog Monster are all fan-favorites in the land-sacrifice archetype for good reason. Each of these cards offers a repeatable sacrifice effect and strong benefits for using it, just like Hearthhull. Squandered Resources, on the other hand, is just a sacrifice engine, though it can work well with these cards.
On top of potentially improving existing synergies, Squandered Resources can also create a few infinite combos. Alongside Aftermath Analyst and Shifting Woodland, for instance, you can make infinite mana, alongside infinite death, landfall, sacrifice, and leave the battlefield triggers. Technically, there are also tons of other combos; however, each of these uses four or more cards, making them somewhat suspect.
The Spike
As mentioned, the percentage spike to Squandered Resources isn’t nearly as impressive as some others we’ve seen recently. Technically, over the past month, this card’s price has only a little more than doubled. While this might not seem like much, Squandered Resources was a $31 MTG card to begin with.
Technically, at the moment, near-mint copies of Squandered Resources are selling for $65. This is the starting point for new listings as well, of which there are only 11 on TCGplayer. Peak sales have topped out at $78 in the past few days, and the average price could easily increase to that point.
Notably, as you can see above, the market price for Squandered Resources has yet to catch up with this price spike. This is due to the incredibly low volume of sales that have taken place. Thanks to being 28 years old and on the Reserved List, there aren’t exactly many copies to go around.
Unfortunately, while there is slightly more supply for worse condition copies, they’re not exactly cheap either. A heavily played copy of Squandered Resources will now set you back $59.98, not even including shipping.
The Future
As a Commander precon-based price spike, there’s a good chance that the hype around Squandered Resources won’t last. This is especially true for the price spikes surrounding the World Shaper precon. While land-sacrifice decks are going to get a popularity boost, this archetype is definitely niche within Commander.
That said, Squandered Resources is a Reserved List card. Unlike some of the Universes Beyond cards with are difficult to reprint, it’s currently impossible for Wizards to reprint this card. Unless Wizards goes back on their promise, this means there will never be any more copies of Squandered Resources in circulation.
In theory, this means that the price of Squandered Resources may stay around the $60 mark long into the future. That said, the key part of the supply and demand equation is demand. Should MTG players not want to pay $60 for this niche card, prices will have to fall to accommodate.
Saying that, for a meh Reserved List card, Squandered Resources is apparently pretty popular in Commander. According to EDHREC, over 14,000 decks are running this card. On top of this, the card does actually see play in cEDH in decks like Korvold, Fae-Cursed King. Even with this in mind, however, the future of this card seems somewhat suspect, as it’s hardly a staple for multiple archetypes.
Ultimately, as always, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens in the long run. Until new precons and legendary creatures are announced and released the true long-term demand will remain a mystery.
Stick with us here at mtgrocks.com: the best site for Magic: The Gathering coverage!