It’s no secret that Final Fantasy is on track to be the best-selling MTG set of all time. According to Hasbro, this set is already the most successful set before release, and there’s no reason that shouldn’t continue. With this in mind, it’s no wonder we’ve seen a range of price spikes in recent weeks thanks to this set.
That said, it’s somewhat surprising that we haven’t seen more action on the MTG financial markets. Typically, a standard set release will cause major surges in demand, especially when new Commander decks are released. While this did happen for the Final Fantasy MTG set, it hasn’t been to the expected level.
Considering how popular each of the four Commander precons is expected to be, it’s baffling that more potential upgrades haven’t spiked. Saying that, the Final Fantasy set isn’t out yet, and players clearly aren’t done upgrading their decks.
Sygg, River Cutthroat
First released 17 years ago in Shadowmoor, Sygg, River Cutthroat is a fairly simple MTG card. At the end of each end step, if an opponent has lost three or more life, you get to draw a card. Compared to current-day MTG, where cards are often walls of text, Sygg is refreshingly simple.
According to EDHREC Sygg, River Cutthroat isn’t hugely popular in Commander, but that’s somewhat expected, as an older card. Currently, Sygg appears in around 24,000 decks, and they can definitely do good work in the format. Since Sygg doesn’t care who deals the damage, you can easily draw a couple of cards per turn cycle, at least.
Should damage really be flying around the board, Sygg, River Cutthroat can get you four cards each turn cycle. Obviously, this has a lot of potential value, so Sygg can work wonders in a deck built around dealing with consistent damage. This is exactly what the new Final Fantasy XIV-themed precon, Scions & Spellcraft, wants to do.
Helmed by Y’shtola, Night’s Blessed, this deck ideally wants opponents to be losing at least four life each turn. Thankfully, Y’shtola makes this easy, thanks to their life drain ability, which triggers upon casting moderately costed spells. Sadly, Sygg can’t trigger this themselves, since Y’shtola cares about noncreature spells, but they’re nonetheless fantastic in the deck.
The only trouble with upgrading the Scions & Spellcraft deck in this way is that Sygg, River Cutthroat doesn’t really fit flavorfully. Mechanically, they’re a great fit, but that doesn’t stop them from looking out of place in the deck. The Final Fantasy Commander decks may be a little too strong for their own good in this regard.
The Spike
Like a lot of the Final Fantasy price spikes that we’ve seen recently Sygg, River Cutthroat has only shot up recently. This is somewhat surprising, considering that Y’shtola was first revealed back in mid-February. While it’s reasonable that some MTG players may wait in case of impending reprints, Sygg getting reprinted did seem unlikely.
While MTG players were slow to jump on the Sygg bandwagon, that was apparently the correct choice. As you can see from the price graph above, the price of Sygg has steadily been falling over the past couple of months. This time last month, Sygg was down to just $2.13 for a near-mint copy of the original Shadowmoor printing.
Once the Scions & Spellcraft deck was revealed in full, however, there was a rush of sales for Sygg, River Cutthroat. This can most clearly be seen on the Zendikar Rising Commander reprint, which has the most supply. On May 15th, a couple of days after the deck’s reveal, over 40 near-mint copies would be sold. Since then, another 90+ copies have changed hands, draining the available supply.
While this rush of demand has caused price spikes for each version of Sygg, the Shadowmoor printing was rare to begin with. As a set from 17 years ago, the print run for this set was significantly smaller than what we have now. The volume of Zendikar Rising Commander copies once on the market proves this fact.
Sadly, this abundance of supply is no longer available, as only 13 near-mint copies of Sygg, River Cutthroat are left for purchase. These copies start at $7.99 for the Zendikar Rising Commander printing and $18 for The List reprint. While the Shadowmoor printing is all sold out at the moment, recent sales show the price spiked to $9.99.
The Future
Unfortunately, even if you don’t mind your MTG cards being slowly worse for wear, there aren’t any deals to be found. While there is more supply, prices still start at $7.99 for the cheapest copy of Sygg right now. Sadly, it’s difficult to say whether or not this is a good deal, since the price of Sygg, River Cutthroat could go either way.
As mentioned, as much as the Final Fantasy Commander decks are hugely popular, they’re also deeply thematic. Each deck is tied heavily to one of the franchise’s games and has new art throughout to support that. This makes upgrading the deck with anything less than perfect a somewhat risky endeavor. Sure, your deck might get better, but it’s going to look worse.
Ultimately, this may be the reason that we’ve seen so few massive price spikes over the past couple of weeks. MTG players and Final Fantasy fans might be all over these decks, but they largely want to keep them stock. Any upgrade has to really knock it out of the park, like Sygg, River Cutthroat arguably does.
As much as Sygg may clear the high bar to entry, this is still a precon-based spike, at the end of the day. Due to this, interest in Sygg, River Cutthroat will likely fade as time goes on and new decks come out. While the Final Fantasy decks should have more staying power, nothing lasts forever. Subsequently, it may not be long until the price of Sygg ends up falling back down.
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