Greetings, Defibrillators!

Wasn't the consensus that red was the worst color in EDH?

Mild Overcorrection

If you've taken a look at the full decklists for the Commander 2014 product, you'll notice that the red deck is the best one, and it's not even close. Ironically, the black deck, fully spoiled first, seems to be the weakest (although the blue one is giving it a run for its money) and even despite an unauthorized leak, we saved the best for last.

Last week, before the entire red deck was spoiled, I brought up the concept of sealed decks as a potential investment (and why I'm not super bullish on it). If you haven't read it yet, go read it now. I'm actually just baffled. Do you read every other article? Is it your first day as an Insider? Do you generally read things labeled "part 2" before "part 1"? Get your act together, man. Seriously.

Last week I didn't know how jimmy-jammed with value the red deck was and I have seen a lot of burgeoning financiers on soapboxes declaring that the red Commander 2014 deck, Built From Scratch, is absolute value town. Apparently you should "take out a second mortgage and buy them," to paraphrase someone who was paraphrasing Travis Woo (who was, at the time, referencing his desire to make Primal Command spike because he's the highest-paid Magic writer for a reason and that reason is he makes bad cards spike).

What kinda value are we talking, here?

We can pretty much stop there, because we're at $55 already; $20 above MSRP. Does this mean we can snag these puppies at MSRP and flip them for an Andrew Jackson while pocketing a bunch of free Magic cards, some of them being things like Scrap Mastery which is a very good card? What makes us think this maneuver is even possible?

Quick Flips

As I mentioned last week, the inclusion of True-Name Nemesis in Mind Seize made the financial equation a good one. MSRP was $29.99 and True-Name Nemesis climbed to $50 a pop. Busting these decks, shipping the Nemeses and having a bunch of gas left over was a no-brainer and lots of speculators scoured Target and Walmart looking for Mind Seizes that EDH players ignored to flip them for value.

With such an easy source of money last time and a similar situation where there are cards that are $20 above MSRP, why would we not buy a ton of red decks and flip them?

Built From Scratch Is Not Mind Seize

I can't emphasize this post enough. I don't think there is enough money to be made buying Built From Scratch even at MSRP and trying to flip.

True-Name Nemesis Spiked Before Eternal Weekend

Last year, Eternal Weekend was right on the heels of the release. This year, Eternal weekend is not only already over, there is nothing in Built From Scratch that compelling in Legacy.

People are talking about using Dualcaster Mage in Legacy, but I really don't see it. Sure, you can use Heat Shimmer to play a terrible version of Splinter Twin that requires you to have a creature to target before you can play Heat Shimmer and Dualcaster on the same turn. You can also use it to copy Fireblast or Lightning Bolt.

Let's not compare this "more cute than good" card to True-Name Nemesis, a card that revolutionized how Legacy Stoneblade decks operated. There's no impending demand for any card in Built From Scratch, even if Dualcaster does prove to be Legacy or Vintage playable. People can get the copies of the cards they want at their leisure.

Legacy is a Four-of Format

EDH, not so much. If none of the cards end up Legacy-playable, you have a situation where a card like True-Name Nemesis, wanted for play in a four-of format, is being compared to a bunch of cards playable in a one-of format. For every Legacy player who wanted to run the maximum number of True-Name Nemesis, you needed to come up with four copies of Mind Seize.

For every EDH player who wants to run Wurmcoil Engine, they have to buy one copy of Built From Scratch, or buy a Wurmcoil online. It's not terribly efficient to buy singles out of Built From Scratch, and nearly half of the value is currently held in a reprint which can't possibly maintain its current price.

Value Spread Over Multiple Cards

Not only that, one of the cards is a reprint and its price is assuredly going to tail off very quickly. If people who don't have Wurmcoil Engine suddenly want one and don't want to play it in a deck that will use more than one- or two cards from Built From Scracth, how desperate were they to get ahold of one? Are they really going to use its reprinting as an impetus to buy a copy for its current, pre-reprint price because it was announced in a deck? Probably not. If they weren't paying $25 for a Wurmcoil last week, they're not doing it this week.

Who's going to buy these Wurmcoils you're selling when they could get 99 other cards for $5 more? No, if speculators do indeed make a run on these decks, they're not making money selling the singles. With a margin as narrow as $20 (it seems big if you're selling for retail), it will be impossible to make any money buylisting the singles unless the spread is practically 0.

Scarcity Is Temporary

If you're going to try and pick the decks up for MSRP to flip them on eBay for more than MSRP, you're looking at fees eating into your margins. Not only that, Wizards has made it clear that if another situation like Mind Seize arises, they will implement a restocking policy that will include more copies of the most in-demand deck so retailers aren't forced to buy five decks to get one they want to sell, thus being forced to order more than they want to and sit on copies of deck that will sell more slowly.

You're going to be hard-pressed to sell these decks for $50+ when Target stores are lousy with them and getting new shipments in all the time.

EDH Players Are Excited About Other Decks

Red is pretty bad in EDH and while I am personally really jazzed about Built From Scratch as a deck, not everyone is. I wonder whether some of the people advising people to buy copies of Built From Scratch have ever met an EDH player.

White and Green are the decks players are talking about for the most part and most players I talk to expressed interest in more than one deck. If you tell an EDH player they can pay $30 for the white deck, $30 for the green deck and $60 for the red deck, they're probably going to buy the blue and black one for that $60 instead and wait to see if the red one gets cheaper. That or they're going to find a sealed one at Target. EDH player demand didn't drive Mind Seize's price up and supply down out of scale with the others, and I don't expect that to happen this time, either.

All in all, I don't really like the idea of buying Built From Scratch at MSRP and trying to arbitrage them somehow. I am sure the reddit buyout brigade will be convinced by the argument and will likely drive the prices up a bit, but driving up prices and being able to sell for a higher price are two entirely different things, and I doubt higher prices stick.

Between reality setting in, retail outlets providing copies for players at MSRP, a lack of urgency vis-a-vis no immediate demand from a four-of format and the five decks being a little closer in power level and playability, I don't think I want to bother trying any maneuvers here. I'm buying one of each deck and I'm going to bust open and play the damn things.

What If There Is No Mind Seize Effect?

I think this is overall good for the prices of all of the singles in the set. A few cards from Commander 2013 are absurdly priced.

There is no question that Doubling Season is better than Primal Vigor. But is it five times better? Hell no, especially since there is no rule that forces you to play one or the other.

What we're seeing is an indirect effect of Mind Seize spiking, in my opinion. There is a degree of high supply inherent in the fact that a ton was always slated to be printed, but the price of all of the singles and even all of the sealed decks in Commander 2013 is pretty low. Since stores couldn't just order Mind Seize decks, they ended up ordering quite a few decks they had a hard time selling.

There is a glut of the sealed decks and as the price for those unwanted decks decreases, the effect that the total cost of a sealed deck has on enforcing the price of the singles will enforce lower prices on the total cost of the singles in a deck. Primal Vigor can never be $20 for if it's in a $22 precon that many stores have copies of sitting around.

In my reviews on the free side, I used $5 as a bit of a high water mark for non-chase, non-mythic singles in these decks. While a card like Primal Vigor, which is one of the best new cards in Commander 2013, struggled and ultimately failed to maintain $5, I think if there is less of a glut of these decks and real demand is allowed to control the rate that the decks sell, we could see some of the better non-mythics from Commander 2014 maintain above $5. I have identified a few potential candidates.

This card is very, very good. I would expect this to be the most valuable non-mythic out of the green deck. Primal Vigor may not be a bad price analog for this card although there is more value in the green deck than there was in Power Hungry (the Jund one with Primal Vigor in it) so that may limit its upside.

This card is insane. If any non-mythic card can break $5, it's this one. While everyone is talking about how insane the red deck is, this card is quietly poised to impact every format where it's legal.

There are a lot of good cards in the white deck and the planewalker is much better than Daretti. The biggest difference? Wurmcoil Engine--a card poised to tank in price due to a reprinting. Don't underestimate this card.

Also in the white deck is this gem. This card is silly in EDH, a format where you can only play one copy of each card. Not only that, this is a one mana copy of any busted equipment your opponent has. The white deck has a lot of tools and this is among its best.

Obviously this card is very good and very hyped-up. This will have a very easy time maintaining above $5, obviously.

The problem is there is nothing obvious in the blue and black decks. This means that the singles prices for all of the playable cards will hover around $2-$4 because the weight has to be distributed and if there is nothing obvious, then it gets distributed evenly.

This is good and bad. It's good at first because there is no card that is worth tearing the sealed sets open and digging into which lowers the price of every other card in the set. It's bad months down the road when the decks aren't selling and the price of the entire deck drops, lowering the price of all of the singles.

My Advice

If you want these to play with, buy them and play with them. But unless you have buyers lined up ahead of time, I would not trifle with trying to arbitrage these decks. They're getting printed a ton, there is no clear, obvious Mind Seize analog despite what some analysts are saying, and I think there are not going to be as many greater fools as you'd need to make money flipping. But if you do want to start trading for singles, pick up the good stuff and don't pay more than $5.