The title for today is a direct reference to the good, the Bad, and the Ugly, which is really how I view M12 as a set. It looks awesome and fun (the Good). In terms of value it looks just like other core sets, which is to say it looks pretty terrible (the Bad). Trading it will be harder more often than it will be easy (the Ugly). Enough about that though, let's see if we can find the Good in the Bad. I'm gonna do it pretty simple, go through each color, look at the cards worth looking at, give you a pre-orders at price, a currently sells at price (where applicable), a price you should shoot for in buy/sale this weekend only, and the price you should be seeing 2 weeks or so out (the week after the release) in value. The preorder pricing is through SCG, since their prices are usually the highest, it will give you a good starting point when looking at pre-orders and who's prices are more manageable. I warn you, the outlook for this set is rather... Grim. All pun intended.

Red:

Grim Lavamancer: Red players rejoice! When you're done rejoicing, shell out a moderate amount of cash!

Preorders @: $6

Currently sells @: $6

Buy @: $3

Sell @: $5

2-week-out price: $4

This is its second set printing, third printing overall counting the premium deck series. the premium deck series has made a large amount of foil's available, so I don't think we'll be seeing prices in the Fauna shaman range here.

Chandra, the Firebrand: The first planeswalker with a single color mana cost comes with some average abilities. She should be decent once she finds her spot though, which is good, since it'll keep her price down for a while. I also don't see her price going insane, shes just not strong enough.

Preorders @: $30

Buy @: $10

Sell @: $15

2-week-out price: $15

$10 may sound low, but I don't want you investing a lot and possibly losing a lot of cash if you can't move them for a profit. It will be hard to find people willing to value her at $10, but there will be people that do.

Chandra's Phoenix

Preorders @: $3

Buy @: $2

Sell @: $5

2-week-out price: $5

A great creature in an aggressive red deck, I think this is the rare to be pre-ordering from the set. For 3 mana you get a 2/2 flying haster that you can get back almost every turn. Keep an eye on these, as they will spike if the rumors of red are true, and then they will die down again.

Black:

Sorin Markov: Same Sorin, different set. Hes still a casual crowd favorite, which will protect his price some.

Preorders @: $10

Currently sells @: $12

Buy @: $3

Sell @: $6

2-week-out price: $7

As a reprint, I expect the price to drop a bit, since I don't think he can maintain a $12 price tag from the casual crowd alone when another set of Sorin's is hitting the market.

Sadly, I wasn't impressed by other black rares/mythics in the set, so that's about where the list starts and stops.

White:

Gideon Jura: Very much the same as Sorin, only vendors buy him at much higher prices since he's seen play.

Preorders @: $20

Currently sells @: $25

Buy @: $9

Sell @: $15

2-week-out price: $15

Grand Abolisher

Preorders @: $6

Buy @: $2

Sell @: $4

2-week-out price: $4-$6

An awesome card with some pretty stacked abilities, however it needs to find a home. With the format changing, it's very very possible for that to happen, though the control decks he shines against so well may not hold up against red. Hold on to a few unless you get someone offering the farm for them.

Green:

Garruk, Primal Hunter: New Garruk has a triple green cost, but his abilities are a bit better than the other triple color costing walker we've seen.

Preorders @: $30

Buy @: $15

Sell @: $20

2-week-out price: $20

I feel comfortable buying these a bit higher than other cards in the set, even though its still a huge risk. If after the first few days of the set, he still looks less than stellar, make the move to drop them quickly. If you don't have a store that buys cards, I would be looking to get him at $12 and below.

Skinshifter

Preorders @: $4

Buy @: $3

Sell @: $5

2-week-out price: $5

A card that will be common in decks running green. His price may be a bit low on the 2 week curve, but we'll see how the color pans out in the hands of deck designers.

Blue:

Jace, Memory Adept: I feel like his pre-order is so high simply because his name is Jace and he's blue. I don't find his abilities or cost to be worth a $40 tag, but it will sadly be hard to get people to part with them for less than that after they watched JtMS climb to crazy highs.

Preorders @: $40

Buy @: $17

Sell @: $25

2-week-out price: $20

Jace's Archivist

Preorders @: $2.50

Buy @: $1

Sell @: $3

2-week-out price: $3

I really like this card, and while there doesn't seem to be a deck out right now that can abuse him, it wouldn't be hard for one to come together. I see this card as a plant for the next set, when he'll shine. Get them low, since I don't think its going to be hard to do.

Artifacts:

Adaptive Automaton: Giving any tribe a lord is awesome. This is probably one of my favorite cards from the set, and it has huge possibilities of seeing play at some point. I expect it to act much like Steel Overseer, and always be worth a few dollars when selling.

Preorders @: $5

Buy @: $3

Sell @: $5

2-week-out price: $5

Lands:

All of the M10 allies lands are back, and a third printing won't be doing anything to help their price. Still, most of them can be sold off for $1-$3 depending on which ones are in favor at that given moment.

Titans

Reprints, so I would expect their value to fall the usual %30, and then fluctuate as they see demand and play.

So what can we see? As usual the mythics are overpriced, and for the most part the money is in the rares, which as we all know is actually a lie because the money never stays in the rares. M12 is a great set to make a profit off in these two weeks. Get product on an as needed basis, and move it as soon as you can. I won't be playing in events just so I can pick up cards as people drop from events so I can move the most inventory possible the same day, as quickly as possible.

As I said above, there are a few sleeper cards, but a majority of them already have players wanting to hoard them, so you should hold off on the en-mass buying of them until they settle down in price after the two weeks mark, and get down to "sleeper" pricing. I don't want to call M12 a terrible set, because it looks like a great limited format....except we're not here to care about limited formats, we're here for finances. M12 is terrible.

Thanks for reading!

Stephen Moss