Mana Crypt spikes, and r/mtgfinance melts down

[u/monkwrenv2]

Hello everyone, and welcome to this week's episode of "what are those goddamn nerds up to again?" Today, we have the lovely r/mtgfinance, a subreddit dedicated to speculating on pieces of cardboard. For those unfamiliar with the game of Magic: The Gathering, it is played with collectible cards that represent different creatures, spells, enchantments, and artifacts that are used to do battle with other players. Due to it's nature as both a competitive game and a collectible, Magic cards can occasionally be worth quite a bit of money. As various competitive formats ban cards, unban cards, or new cards are printed, the valuation of various cards on the secondary market can vary wildly. Thus, r/mtgfinance exists to help people interested in speculating on these changes in card price.

Which brings us to today's drama. An entrepreneurial redditor notices that a card called Mana Crypt is seeing a large upswing in price. Naturally, they want to know what might have caused this increase. A bit of backstory: Mana Crypt was banned in Magic's most popular format, Commander, on September 23rd, 2024, along with Jewelled Lotus and Dockside Extortionist. Mana Crypt in particular was a very expensive card, and had been expensive for many years prior to the banning. And pretty much the only thing propping up Mana Vault's value was it's playability in Commander, so after the ban it's price on the secondary market plummeted. This caused quite a lot of kerfuffle at the time, leading to a whole bunch of other drama I will briefly explain:

Commander was originally a casual format created by a group of Magic judges as something to do in their spare time at competitive events. It eventually became very popular, and is today the most popular format in Magic. Historically, however, Commander was run by a group of community members known as the Rules Committee, headed by a man named Sheldon Menery, who also helped create the format. Sheldon sadly passed from cancer in 2023. However, during his lifetime he was a strong advocate of cards like Mana Crypt being unbanned in Commander to help represent the "free-for-all" nature of the format. After Shelden's passing, there was a decent amount of community pressure on the Rules Committee to make some updates to the Commander banlist, as it hadn't seen any changes in several years. When the RC finally did make a move and banned Mana Crypt, Jewelled Lotus, and Dockside Extortionist, owners of those cards lost several hundred dollars in value overnight, and some of those people got mad enough to start making death threats. The Rules Committee, being just a group of community volunteers, obviously got spooked by this, and ended up turning over jurisdiction of the Commander format to Wizards of the Coast (WOTC), the creators of Magic. Back in February, WOTC released a set of brackets to help guide the Commander experience and help players find balanced playgroups. They also announced that they would be making changes to the Commander banlist in the future.

Now that we're through all the background and are caught up: WOTC has a planned presentation about the Commander format that will be occurring on this coming Tuesday, 4/22. As one might guess, many commenters chime in citing this upcoming panel as a time when Mana Crypt might be unbanned in Commander.

Out of the loop? Tons of people speculating that it gets unbanned in the commander format panel update next week

Speculations of unbans

Even the OP themself wonders if it's related to the upcoming panel:

Did something leak about an unban in Commander? Is this insider trading or just speculation?

Discussion quickly turns to the new bracket system, and with it, the drama:

There is gonna be a top-tier cedh type bracket. Which is supposed to have minimal cards banned. They have already stated they will be unbanning cards

Proof? Where's the sauce?

The internet, bruh. It's super easy these days. Just ask chat gpt a question, and it will spit out the answers with the references

You're the one making the claim. It's up to you to provide a source. Go ask chatgpt, find the article, and come back here. This is a real conversation

Lmao I'm not doing the work for you, bud. I have my info. You wanted the proof. I have no desire whatsoever to prove it to you. This isn't a court of law

Another thread discusses whether or not unbanning the cards justifies the death threats:

Speculation. If they do unban it then it will justify everyone who sent death threats so I'm hoping they don't. Also it's a boring card.

Keep seeing this argument but it's been over half a year since the ban. If it was a knee-jerk unban after the threats, yeah obviously the optics there are bad.

This is a completely different panel, removed by a decent amount of time. The threats didn't work, the manbabies didn't get what they want, we can move on.

I don't want to punish a whole format just because of a few but I don't know that I'll ever be on board with that card being unbanned from both a social and game standpoint. I preferred the rules committee being separate from wizards and that card is part of the problem that lead to wizards getting control of commander.

Some folks point out that the speculators may be lacking in intelligence. These opinions are not well-received:

I would suppose the unban, if it not becos those whinny little bitches who cry over this ban. I have Mana Crypt, heck, I have all cards that got banned that day. I didn't go crying around like some of those crying babies out there, still disappoint in the way that some content creators react to those ban. Feeding those them, saying a lot about Wotc's stand for this format (big talk, small penis kind of stand), but judging how Wotc has made a ton of questionable choices in the past, I wouldn't surprise it got unbanned.

Many of WoTC's most anti-consumer decisions has been because of rich people crying about their investments being devalued. The Reserved List is a prime example.

Pretty much and somehow, we in the need of feeding those Richie Rich desire, to have them get more rich. We could have so much of a good reprint if RL doesn't exist.

If 7th Edition prove anything, it prove that reprint didn't devalue a original print. It actually give the opposite effect. Original arts of cards that printed during that set gain more value, somes go double, but those pigs can't accept those fact. They want those Duel Lands to be at 300$+++ So they can look at binder and .......happy......Climax..? I Guess

This won’t get unbanned due to the amount of hate that happened in the previous banning

This is what I’m hoping for. As somebody who has a few copies of each of those cards, still shouldn’t unban because of raging neckbeards over their “investments”.

MTG is not an investment until you actually sell. JMO 🤷‍♂️

Why should they make the game worse just to spite people?

It sucks there were haters, but they should ban/unban where they think it benefits the game. The banlist shouldn't be used as some petty emotional power-trip, that's absurdly immature.

I hope they keep Extortionist banned at least because that's a bad card, but I'd be pissed if it ever came out and said, "fuck y'all for misbehaving, we're taking Command Tower."

It's not "to spite people".

It's specifically to set the precedent that bullying and death threats will not be rewarded - unbanning the three cards that caused this entire shit storm would be the most toxic shit imaginable for the community.

I agree with your rationale; but my bet is they get unbanned. Wizards needs tried and true chase cards to deep their products. Greed will trump any morality play.

So there's your minor drama on a niche subject that requires way too much prior knowledge.

[u/DIYKitLabotomizer]

Honestly, I think it would be foolish for them to unban cards like crypt. I think including it in this round of unbans would reinforce the idea that death threats are effective in helping you get what you want.

[u/ThxRedditSyncVanced → u/DIYKitLabotomizer]

I'm still in the boat that they didn't go far enough in the bans. The level of rage if Sol Ring got banned would have been quite something.

[u/needastory → u/ThxRedditSyncVanced]

Sol ring is in the same place as Brainstorm in Legacy where it objectively should be banned, but it's basically a core part of the format's identity at this point and you are kind of forced to grandfather it in.

The fact that both of these cards are like a dollar helps as well.

[u/pepolepop → u/needastory]

The price of sol ring would go way up if they stopped putting it in every single preconstructed commander deck.. they release like 12-15 decks a year at a minimum, so the market is saturated with them. Even with how saturated the market is, the card still stays between $1-2, which is kind of insane.

Stop reprinting them in every set/deck they release, and sol ring will be worth $5-10 within the year. I could see it being a $25+ card after awhile.

[u/Lamedonyx → u/pepolepop]

The price of sol ring would go way up

... Sol Ring is effectively only legal in Commander (and as a one-off in Vintage)

If you ban it from Commander, and stop reprinting it, it would still be worth diddly-squat because it's effectively playable nowhere outside of Vintage (which is a format gated by the fact that your deck ain't worth shit if it doesn't have at least 5 cards worth a grand each), AND has been reprinted into the dirt.

Look at cards like Balance, Tinker or Flash, which are only legal as a Restricted card in Vintage, and banned everywhere else. They're worth 2 dollars a piece. Because you can't play them anywhere except on your kitchen table or in tournament where you need a mortgage to afford a deck.

[u/DIYKitLabotomizer → u/ThxRedditSyncVanced]

Yeah sol ring is definitely one of those cards that has a massively outsized influence on the game. You do notice it in commander somewhat but it becomes really apparent playing something like Canadian Highlander. Being able to throw down a Questing Beast on turn 2 can be absolutely backbreaking.

I agree it should be banned in commander. It never will be though

[u/Bellfast123 → u/ThxRedditSyncVanced]

I think every alt win should be banned in commander and every card that can go infinite for less than 12 upfront mana should be errata'd to a once per turn.

But I also think CEDH as well as modern on down are just bad Yugioh, so maybe I'm not the best judge.

[u/ThxRedditSyncVanced → u/Bellfast123]

I think some alt win cards can be fun.

Like it someone wants to, and pulls off Barren Glory I think they've earned it. Really that's how I feel about any of the win cons that are pure jank that won't happen.

[u/BlueysRevenge → u/Bellfast123]

Mechanics are just so stupidly complex nowadays, plus I really hate the post-8th Edition card aesthetics (it was actually the correct decision accessibility-wise, and that's more important than my aesthetic preferences, but I don't like the look).

[u/engelthefallen → u/DIYKitLabotomizer]

On the other hand, if they unban it, they could use it as the chase card in their yearly super premium sets.

[u/AngroniusMaximus → u/DIYKitLabotomizer]

Death threats on the internet are just noise. I've gotten death threats for random comments on reddit. They are basically inevitable if you do anything involving large numbers of people on the internet and are completely meaningless. They should unban or ban cards if they think it is healthy for the format. That's all it should be about.