Unbans aren’t a common scene in Magic: the Gathering, but when they do happen, they always completely upheave the secondary market. Any strategies supported by the unbanned cards, and the unbanned cards themselves, all skyrocket in price. That said, Faithless Looting is in a bit of a different spot than the other unbanned cards. That’s because the card has a lot of common reprintings.
Like many of the unbanned Modern MTG cards, Faithless Looting is also good in Commander. Because of this, the card has appeared in a ton of precons. This allowed the cheaper variants of Faithless Looting to dodge the inflation that was caused by its unban in Modern.
What didn’t escape inflation is the more premium versions of Faithless Looting. For the players who want to play with the most stylish Faithless Lootings available, be prepared to open your wallet.
Faithless Looting
Faithless Looting’s unban in the Modern format was nothing short of shocking. Thanks to its degenerate interaction with Arclight Phoenix, Faithless Looting was ejected from the Modern format. Sadly, Faithless Looting’s bans weakened a bunch of other fan-favorite Modern classics like Dredge and Hollow One. Those decks are beginning to return with Faithless Looting’s reemergence, but Arclight Phoenix looks like a relatively dead deck.
Of all the new synergies with Faithless Looting since it was banned in Modern, its ability to flip Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student for just one mana looks to be the best. With Mox Opal newly unbanned, this allows you to flip Tamiyo in the Modern format on as early as turn one.
Faithless Looting also pairs well with Reanimation strategies. Using Persist to bring back an Archon of Cruelty on turn two is now possible. All you need to do is discard the card with Faithless Looting on turn one. This, combined with Indomitable Creativity creates a deadly combination.
Whether you’re reliving the old glory days of some Modern titans or you’re trying something new, everyone’s experimenting with Faithless Looting.
The Spike
At the moment, there are a few copies of Faithless Looting that are quite a bit more expensive than the rest. The graph above is for the Strixhaven Archives Japanese variant, which holds a massive premium over all of the other Faithless Looting on the market. The listed median for Faithless Looting, as of the writing of this article, was $45, which is way higher than the current market average for them. Recent sales suggest that this card is worth even more, with the nonfoil version commonly selling for $50, but boasting $80 outliers. Before the unban, just a week ago, this card was only worth $7.
The Secret Lair Faithless Looting is worth about $10-$12. Like the other Faithless Looting variants, the market average for this card is way behind the curve. Foils for this variant are worth between $14-15.
Next, the retro-bordered Faithless Looting and the infamous English Mystical Archive Faithless Looting are both worth about $7-$8. Considering how much controversy Carly Mazur’s artwork generated, I’m personally surprised that these cards aren’t going for more.
The rest of the Faithless Lootings tend to sell for between $1-$3. The one exception is Dark Ascension foils for the card, which appear to have price tags all over the map. At their highest, the Dark Ascension foils may be the most expensive version of Faithless Looting, but the Japanese Mystical Archive are expensive for both foil and nonfoil variants.
The Future
While the cheaper variants of Faithless Looting will likely stay the same thanks to Commander interest, the high-end copies of the card will likely fluctuate on their continued Modern viability. That’s the reason why the cards spiked, after all. This means that, if Faithless Looting sees lots of play, these could continue to increase in price. If they don’t, the premium versions of these cards will likely be… a little less premium.
For the time being, no Faithless Looting-dependent decks are making a strong dent in the Modern metagame, but the card is seeing continued experimentation. Faithless Looting looks like just another player in a larger game, but we’ll see where the card ends up.
