Because it's the only more or less unlimited remove-any-permanent card that isn't about to rotate? D-Sphere and Abrupt Decay are soon to disappear from Standard. And no one is dumb enough to think Oblivion Ring will ever be reprinted. Banishing Light and its annoyingly fixed templating is clearly the direction WotC is going in. As such the card is not only a requirement for the upcoming Standard season, but should rightly be considered a mandatory 4-of in the collection of anyone who wants to be able to build competitive Standard decks for probably the next five years. Banishing Light, like Naturalize, is probably always going to be in Standard from here on out.
M15 seems to be the target on rampant speculation.
Do you buy the cards you like now or do you wait until they establish themselves in decks after rotation?
Depends on how good a read you have on the meta. If you are really, really confident that a current bulk rare is an undiscovered "sleeper" (ie., a card that's going to spike), then by all means snap it up now, but don't go in on a half measure - buy four or more playsets, one to keep, three for profit. Imagine being the guy who bought 50 Splinter Twins when they were 50 cents and then got to sell them off at $20... I know for a fact (from a friend who used to work for a major online retailer) that they sold precisely such a bulk lot, at that price, about a month before the deck broke. In speculation terms, that's called "catching the white stag". I had a much more modest success when I correctly guessed Amulet of Vigor would someday make it into a deck and grabbed a few dozen at bulk rates, but my return on that investment was much less.
If you're not confident in a "sleeper", though, then I would wait for hyped-up prices to drop before buying in. Try to find a friend who has the cards you need so you can borrow them for decks - pool your collections so you can each build what you want without having to pay hyped prices for cards. Once Khans comes out, basically all the rares that haven't managed to prove themselves in decks will plummet to much more stable prices, and even the successful ones will begin a slow downwards trend.
That being said, don't forget that core sets tend not to be opened in such large quantities as block sets, because they're just not as "sexy", partially due to the many reprints. So as a result, any Standard staple-rare in a core set tends to exist in fewer numbers until much later in its Standard rotation than a similarly-valuable Block set Standard staple-rare. Just as many were printed but more of them will be sitting around in packs unopened. This effect will be strong this time around, as Khans will be heavily opened by EDH fanatics like me, as it looks like a really rich flavor-based set with gold themed shenanigans. Once Khans hits store shelves, M15 will look about as attractive as week-old fish. Packs of M15 will gather dust, their rares therefore kept off the market.
Courser can't go much higher than $20 as long as clash packs are readily available. They already pay for themselves between Nykthos, Courser and Temple of Mystery.
anyone know why the sudden uprising of keranos, god???
It's suddenly seeing play in Modern and even Legacy. Plus people presumably think it'll be good in Standard post-rotation, so that's driving it up too.
Master of Waves seems to have nowhere to go but up. I would hang onto him. I don't see how he can dip much lower since some Merfolk decks run him as a 2-of. Ie., he's not going to be totally unplayed even after he rotates.
Thassa is another matter. She could either gain or lose, depending on whether Khans gives us a deck that wants her. (I am hoping for a 5-color control resurgence, and such a deck might conceivably want indestructible grindy enchantments.) Personally I think she'll stay about where she is or drop slightly.
Mono-blue appears likely to be dead on rotation. It loses two of its one-drop fliers, Nightveil Specter, and some of its best control cards like Rapid Hybridization. Khans appears to be gold themed so who knows if we will get enough cheap, efficient mono-blue beaters to shore up what mono-blue is losing to rotation? At the very least it will probably take until the end of Khans block for Mono-blue to reassemble its toolset, by which time people may have lost interest altogether.
Hang onto the Master because of eternal format semi-viability, hang onto Thassa if you think Khans will make her good again. But don't bet on Mono-blue surviving rotation. Too many of its business cards are going away.
I need some advice guys; I pulled a Sarkhan at the prerelease on Friday but do you think I should sell him while he's $22?
He'll likely linger between 22-25 for the length of his stay in standard, if you look at Elspeth's trends. He may end up being even more played, though. I'd hang on to it.
I don't really see anything beating Sarkhan for what he does once Stormbreath rotates, so it's probably a good idea to hold onto him until after the next rotation.
This is assuming fr49200 actually wants to play with the Sarkhan, of course. I don't think there's much room for him to grow beyond $22-$25, so if there's something you want more than Sarkhan, feel free to trade for it. But don't expect to sell off the Sarkhan and get one later for a lot cheaper.
I didn't realize the price jump for a foil Polluted Delta was so extreme i wanna sell it now, but i get the feeling i should just wait till it rotates out. Both planewalkers are around 30$ us currently so your best bet in getting one seems to be in a box since around where i am people have been pulling at least one if not both in a box along side quite a few fetches.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Standard: No Time
Modern: Jund Midrange BRG
Legacy: Shardless Bug BUG
This is assuming fr49200 actually wants to play with the Sarkhan, of course. I don't think there's much room for him to grow beyond $22-$25, so if there's something you want more than Sarkhan, feel free to trade for it. But don't expect to sell off the Sarkhan and get one later for a lot cheaper.
Yeah I decided to keep him. At the very least I can have him replace Chandra in my Mono-Red Standard deck, and maybe I can use him in the cube I'm thinking of making.
you remembered that lifebane zombie is a card.
Well there's that but it's also the only deck that can beat Supreme Verdict and Master of Waves consistently.
If they didn't give the Master pro. red the whole metagame would be different.
Because it's the only more or less unlimited remove-any-permanent card that isn't about to rotate? D-Sphere and Abrupt Decay are soon to disappear from Standard. And no one is dumb enough to think Oblivion Ring will ever be reprinted. Banishing Light and its annoyingly fixed templating is clearly the direction WotC is going in. As such the card is not only a requirement for the upcoming Standard season, but should rightly be considered a mandatory 4-of in the collection of anyone who wants to be able to build competitive Standard decks for probably the next five years. Banishing Light, like Naturalize, is probably always going to be in Standard from here on out.
--Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., who is up in Heaven now. EDH WUBRG Child of Alara WUBRG BGW Karador, Ghost Chieftain BGW RGW Mayael the Anima RGW WUB Sharuum the Hegemon WUB RWU Zedruu the Greathearted RWU
WB Ghost Council of Orzhova WB RG Ulasht, the Hate Seed RG B Korlash, Heir to Blackblade B G Molimo, Maro-Sorcerer G *click the general's name to see my list!*
I hope this card gets reprinted in KTK. I should have got them early. I don't like paying $2+ for uncommons.
Might just play Back to Nature
Modern: RW Burn
Do you buy the cards you like now or do you wait until they establish themselves in decks after rotation?
Depends on how good a read you have on the meta. If you are really, really confident that a current bulk rare is an undiscovered "sleeper" (ie., a card that's going to spike), then by all means snap it up now, but don't go in on a half measure - buy four or more playsets, one to keep, three for profit. Imagine being the guy who bought 50 Splinter Twins when they were 50 cents and then got to sell them off at $20... I know for a fact (from a friend who used to work for a major online retailer) that they sold precisely such a bulk lot, at that price, about a month before the deck broke. In speculation terms, that's called "catching the white stag". I had a much more modest success when I correctly guessed Amulet of Vigor would someday make it into a deck and grabbed a few dozen at bulk rates, but my return on that investment was much less.
If you're not confident in a "sleeper", though, then I would wait for hyped-up prices to drop before buying in. Try to find a friend who has the cards you need so you can borrow them for decks - pool your collections so you can each build what you want without having to pay hyped prices for cards. Once Khans comes out, basically all the rares that haven't managed to prove themselves in decks will plummet to much more stable prices, and even the successful ones will begin a slow downwards trend.
That being said, don't forget that core sets tend not to be opened in such large quantities as block sets, because they're just not as "sexy", partially due to the many reprints. So as a result, any Standard staple-rare in a core set tends to exist in fewer numbers until much later in its Standard rotation than a similarly-valuable Block set Standard staple-rare. Just as many were printed but more of them will be sitting around in packs unopened. This effect will be strong this time around, as Khans will be heavily opened by EDH fanatics like me, as it looks like a really rich flavor-based set with gold themed shenanigans. Once Khans hits store shelves, M15 will look about as attractive as week-old fish. Packs of M15 will gather dust, their rares therefore kept off the market.
--Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., who is up in Heaven now. EDH WUBRG Child of Alara WUBRG BGW Karador, Ghost Chieftain BGW RGW Mayael the Anima RGW WUB Sharuum the Hegemon WUB RWU Zedruu the Greathearted RWU
WB Ghost Council of Orzhova WB RG Ulasht, the Hate Seed RG B Korlash, Heir to Blackblade B G Molimo, Maro-Sorcerer G *click the general's name to see my list!*
It's suddenly seeing play in Modern and even Legacy. Plus people presumably think it'll be good in Standard post-rotation, so that's driving it up too.
Master of Waves seems to have nowhere to go but up. I would hang onto him. I don't see how he can dip much lower since some Merfolk decks run him as a 2-of. Ie., he's not going to be totally unplayed even after he rotates.
Thassa is another matter. She could either gain or lose, depending on whether Khans gives us a deck that wants her. (I am hoping for a 5-color control resurgence, and such a deck might conceivably want indestructible grindy enchantments.) Personally I think she'll stay about where she is or drop slightly.
Mono-blue appears likely to be dead on rotation. It loses two of its one-drop fliers, Nightveil Specter, and some of its best control cards like Rapid Hybridization. Khans appears to be gold themed so who knows if we will get enough cheap, efficient mono-blue beaters to shore up what mono-blue is losing to rotation? At the very least it will probably take until the end of Khans block for Mono-blue to reassemble its toolset, by which time people may have lost interest altogether.
Hang onto the Master because of eternal format semi-viability, hang onto Thassa if you think Khans will make her good again. But don't bet on Mono-blue surviving rotation. Too many of its business cards are going away.
--Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., who is up in Heaven now. EDH WUBRG Child of Alara WUBRG BGW Karador, Ghost Chieftain BGW RGW Mayael the Anima RGW WUB Sharuum the Hegemon WUB RWU Zedruu the Greathearted RWU
WB Ghost Council of Orzhova WB RG Ulasht, the Hate Seed RG B Korlash, Heir to Blackblade B G Molimo, Maro-Sorcerer G *click the general's name to see my list!*
Standard
UR Control
Modern
Merfolk
Burn
Avacyn did nothing wrong!
Purify Innistrad!
#Purge
He'll likely linger between 22-25 for the length of his stay in standard, if you look at Elspeth's trends. He may end up being even more played, though. I'd hang on to it.
Perhaps speccing on a few cheapies but nothing expensive. The prices are just too damn high. It's like Wizards are slipping a $50 note in each box.
I pre ordered two of them from Channelfireball when he was listed at $11.99. Should have gotten more!
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Modern: Jund Midrange BRG
Legacy: Shardless Bug BUG
Yeah I decided to keep him. At the very least I can have him replace Chandra in my Mono-Red Standard deck, and maybe I can use him in the cube I'm thinking of making.
Standard
UR Control
Modern
Merfolk
Burn
Avacyn did nothing wrong!
Purify Innistrad!
#Purge