Its been a week since Wizards of the Coast’s ban announcement. Even though bans were the name of the game, two cards ended up getting unbanned instead. In an effort to use the new power levels presented in Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth instead of revert it, cards are coming off the ban list instead of new ones being added. This is the better reality if it’s a realistic one. We’ll have to see if the like of The One Ring and Orcish Bowmasters are truly allowing for old banes to come back, or are still too powerful.
Either way, the unbanning of Preordain and Mind’s Desire have unshockingly caused the namesake cards to skyrocket in price. They have taken over the secondary market to some extent, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t some other movements as well. Let’s take a look!
Unban Updates
Thanks to Preordain and Mind’s Desire spiking aggressively just days after their unban, we already covered many of the price movements in greater detail. That said, time marches on, and these cards have seen more price changes since our last discussion. Here’s a more rapid-fire look at the changes:
Putting aside foil M11 Preordains, the fancy Secret Lair Preordain has stabilized at around $25. This is a bit lower than the initial spike seen last week, but is still a massive price spike overall from what was just $7.
The old-bordered Preordains from The Brothers’ War are continuing to cover ground, but the rate of increase has slowed down a fair bit. Earlier this week, these cards were going for around $10 for the most part. The average remains around the same, and the higher end has pushed past $14. Considering these were about 93 cents pre-spike, it is a massive increase.
While nonfoil iterations of the full art Preordain from Commander Masters are currently declining, the foil copies have continued to increase and have surpassed $20.
Lord of the Rings Preordains continue to spike aggressively, with confirmed sales prices hitting $12. They were worth only 50 cents pre-unban. This is a 2300% spike over the course of a week!
Mind’s Desire tells similar stories. The Scourge copy is the one that has spiked the most aggressively only going for about $4 when we talked about these cards last week, nonfoil copies of Mind’s Desire have spiked from a dollar to.. well an incredibly unstable amount. There are some copies of nonfoil Scourge Mind’s Desire selling for $16. Others are selling for $5. For the most part, near mint and lightly played Mind’s Desires tend to stick above $10. Moderately played an non-english Mind’s Desires are selling for around $5.
Foil Scourge Mind’s Desire haven’t sold much since the ninth, but they appear to be worth about $200 at the time of writing.
For the Japanese Mind’s Desire Mystical Archive variant from Strixhaven, all variants seem to be still increasing in price, but not a ton of copies are selling. Etched Foil Mind’s Desire seems to be worth about $18. Nonfoil copies appear to be worth about $7 and foil copies have a wide range of prices, with $35 being the higher end of it.
Read More: Turn Three Emrakul Combo Causes Massive 900% Price Spike!
Urza’s Workshop
Urza’s Workshop has seen a surprising spike in price this week. While the hype brought by Mono Green Tron’s breakout performance at the Lord of the Rings Pro Tour may have brought some excitement for the archetype, Urza’s Workshop doesn’t see much competitive play.
Because this is a Commander release, Urza’s Workshop is not legal in Modern. You can find this in the occasional Mystic Forge deck in Legacy, but its quite a rarity. Commander is likely the reason why this card is spiking, and Commander Masters probably has a lot to do with it.
This card is notably a fantastic upgrade to the Eldrazi Unbound deck. The deck already comes with a complete suite of Tronlands, so Urza’s Workshop has the potential of tapping for four mana in that deck! This is pretty unlikely to happen but, even with Metalcraft activated and just one other Urza land, this turns into an Ancient Tomb, one of the best lands in the Commander format.
For that reason, Urza’s Workshop has spiked from $3.75. The market average for this card is currently around $13 for its nonfoil version (notably more expensive than the foil), but cards seem to be selling for either $12 or $19, which is kind of odd.
Read More: MTG’s Newest Deck Features Multiple $30 Reprints!
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
Another card whose price is likely affected by the rise of colorless Commander decks, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon has a long and loud history in Magic. While colorless Commander interest is definitely at play (this seems like a great upgrade to Eldrazi Unbound), the card does see competitive play in the Modern format.
Thanks to Pro Tour Lord of the Rings, Mono Green Tron, and Tron overall, has seen a major resurgence. The deck saw an uptick in play thanks to The One Ring being absolutely incredible in the archetype. Tron is now a true meta contender thanks to the Pro Tour, and lists utilizing Ugin, the Spirit Dragon have been putting up results in regional level events.
For all these reasons, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon has seen a big monetary spike across its multiple variants. The original M21 version of the card was going for about $15 mid-July. The card has since spiked to about $30, but there are some outliers with Ugin’s sales across variants. Here, the outliers are going for $40.
Fate’s Reforge Ugins are now going for about the same amount, but outliers reach $50. This does not mean $50 is currently a fair price for a Fate Reforged Ugin. There are just instances of the card successfully selling for that amount. Full art M21 Ugins are going for about $40. There are some other premium variants that are going for even more.
Read More: The Most Expensive Commander Masters Reprints
Ichormoon Gauntlet
Upgrades to the Eldrazi Unbound deck aren’t the only Commander Masters upgrades seeing a spike in price. Sliver upgrades and Superfriends upgrades are also seeing spikes in price thanks to their respective archetypes getting a Commander Masters preconstructed release – as long as the release did not reprint the card, that is.
Ichormoon Gauntlet is the biggest common upgrade to the Superfriends archetype that was not reprinted in the preconstructed deck. Of course, since the card involves infinite turn loops, its inclusion in your deck may not be appropriate for your table. Take this into account.
Either way, the constroversial artifact seemingly handcrafted for Superfriends EDH decks is currently going for about $8.50 in its cheapest variant. This represents about a $5 price spike from the release of the Commander Masters precon decklists.
Read More: 5 Budget Underrated Lord of the Rings MTG Cards in EDH!
