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Stop irking Marcel, folks.
Short of that, stop speculating on cards just because of Tiny Leaders. Yes, the format is blowing up, but we don't know anything about its future. We don't know if it will be around in six weeks, much less a year from now.
Then again, if this is the new Commander, we don't want to give up the valuable opportunities for profit. A dilemma.
The Types of Cards Worth Buying
Here's where I think any Tiny Leaders speculation is best placed:
- Legacy staples,
- ...that aren't legal in Modern.
That's pretty much it. Legacy staples have an established format to back up their values--even if Tiny Leaders ends up being just a flash in the pan, these cards won't crash overnight. By buying cards that aren't legal in Modern, we avoid getting blown out by a Modern Masters reprint, or worse, a normal booster expansion reprint.
Here's some examples of a couple cards that fit our criteria:
Stoneforge Mystic: Recently pushing past $30, this card is one of the most powerful white cards printed in years ever. As it's banned in Modern, we won't be seeing it MM15, and I really don't expect it to be reprinted in Standard at basically any point. A Duel Deck printing could destroy it financially, but Wizards has thus far resisted printing cards quite that expensive in these products. The buy-in is high, but if Tiny Leaders is the next big thing, so will be this card's price.
True-Name Nemesis: This is less than $20. Wizards may have doubled the number of Mind Seizes printed during the latter part of the product's shelf life, but that's well in the past now, and this should start climbing with or without the help of Tiny Leaders. The card has proven itself in Legacy play already and is a rare printed only in a preconstructed deck. It will go up over time, and seriously, could you see WOTC ever printing this in Standard? There's no way.
I like these two a lot, because they'r'e merely related to Tiny Leaders. They're not speculation born of the format.
What About Cards in Modern?
Buying cards for Tiny Leaders that could be reprinted in Modern Masters 2015 is risky. In particular, I don't like buying Dark Confidant or Vendilion Clique. More than just a potential reprint, though, these cards have climbed higher than the amount of play they are currently seeing seems to warrant. Even a small influx of supply could bring the price down further than we might otherwise think.
Young Pyromancer is more intriguing to me, as it has demonstrated its power from Vintage to Modern and has never really had a significant price jump. It was printed in an underselling core set, and could easily be a $10 uncommon before long. The biggest risk is that a reprint, especially at uncommon, would destroy any upside the card had. I think there's a lot of potential here, but going too deep is ill-advised.
There are a few powerhouses in Standard that will be good in this format, but now is not the time to pick them up. That said, when rotation hits this fall, if Tiny Leaders is still a thing, Brimaz, King of Oreskos and Goblin Rabblemaster should be fine pickups. Keep a close eye for the floor on these two cards. (Monastery Mentor goes in this category, too, but its rotation is further off.)
On Foils
I don't play foils myself, and I admit my understanding of the foil market is not as expert as other QS writers. Only once in my QS career have I recommended buying a foil (Hornet Queen at between $4 and $5) and that's not going to change today.
What interests me about foils, of course, are the huge multipliers, but I'm looking at the non-foils with the most intrigue. Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest and Alesha, Who Smiles at Death, are sitting at around $.50 and a $1 respectively. Their foils, though, are around ten times as valuable. It's too early in the life cycle of the Tiny Leaders format to really make a call here, but a ten-times multiplier seems excessive.
What's important about these two cards is that they are the only commanders in the format who allow for these color combinations. If someone is a huge fan of Mardu or Jeskai, these are their only options. For these reasons, I really like Shu Yun and Alesha as throw-in targets for trades. Try to pick them up after drafts if you notice anyone playing them. The opportunity cost here is very low, and the upside could be a triple up or better.
Tiny Leaders' Niche in the Community
As a player, I'm excited about Tiny Leaders. I love playing powerful cards from throughout Magic's history in a competitive fashion. But much as Legacy sounds awesome, opportunities to play are limited and I'm really too cheap to shell out for a deck I'll barely ever get to use. Modern's format is too ever-changing for me to go deep.
Cube can provide the ability to play powerful cards from throughout Magic's history, but you need a decent-sized group, and people the cube owner can trust, at that. Still, the singleton nature of Cube means more cards can be represented and the format will be more varied. Commander offers a Constructed option in a singleton format with almost any card available, but the higher life totals and multiplayer games don't offer that competitive thrill.
That's where Tiny Leaders comes in. It's another singleton format, which is huge, because singleton formats appreciate new card printings so much more. Modern white weenie decks didn't care much about the printing of Mardu Woe-Reaper, but Cube owners were thrilled to get another aggressive white one-drop.
Despite being a singleton format, deck construction and games play more out like Legacy, which means the format can give a competitive outlet for players looking for that. And the fact that it's a constructed format means one can show up with a deck and play without having to gather a trusted group for cubing.
Tiny Leaders fills a niche, and I hope it does end up being A Real Thing™. As a finance community, let's try to not drive up prices so far that the format fails before it can even get off the ground. Thanks, guys and girls.
It does seem fun, but I really wish it were multiplayer.
My play group plays it both as a 1v1 format as well as 2-headed giant. We use 45 life for the team. It’s actually quite fun to play 2-headed
The format feels like “Legacy Light” to me, so your recommendation of sticking with Legacy staples not in Modern seems spot on. This format is just another reason to also own Dual Lands…
Sigmund, did you ever played a TL game?
Woah, you have totally flubbed the call on Stoneforge Mystic. Batterskull is too big and Umezawa’s Jitte is banned. Everything that makes SFM relevant in Legacy is not available in Tiny Leaders. Do not buy this card because you like Tiny Leaders. Maybe this is over the top, but this probably warrants an article edit its so inaccurate.
Ben, I understand you can have frustrations about the quality of some articles. I know that feeling.
But I’m afraid you are wrong here too.
The point in this article is that it’s best to identify cards that are popular in tiny leaders AND legacy.
Legacy already give us a high demand, extra demand from tiny leaders will result in a higher chance that demand will move the price up.
If a card only gets demand from Tiny Leaders, demand may not be high enough to move the price.
So it’s not important WHAT you will search with Stoneforge mystic, it’s important that you can tutor strong equipment with it (swords of X and Y, sword of the meek, cranial plating, lightning greaves, champion’s helm,…).
And Tiny leaders is young, maybe you played the format thousand times, and never met a deck with stoneforge mystic, that’s possible. My experience is mostly based on the local decks, and there is not a white deck without stoneforge mystic here.
So my conclusion, tiny leaders wants stoneforge mystic. Even if it’s not good, there is extra demand in my local area. I’m convinced I can mirror this observation to the bigger market too.
Thanks for the thoughtful response. I think its very interesting how much of the discussion about Tiny Leaders is based on anecdote, because all we have to go off is the local metagame. The format is unsolved. I can see wanting SFM for swords, but insofar as we are looking at Tiny Leaders as “Legacy Light” it would seem we need some deeper interpretation of exactly what that phrase means. I guess I am guilty of eliding two concepts here: Good in “Legacy and TL” and “Good in Legacy or TL” where the disjunction refers to cards that may be good in TL for different reasons than they are good in Legacy. In any case I think Danny might want to at least note that if SFM is good in TL, it wont be for the same reasons its good in Legacy. Specifically, calling attention to the fact that Jitte is banned seems responsible.
In order to turn anecdote into evidence we need data!
So, everyone, tell us more about your local meta! How many people are running SFM and what are they tutoring for?
I can’t imagine wanting to fetch a cranial plating in all seriousness. Have you seen anyone win this way? I can see swords being good. Which swords are people playing at your shop? Give us more input so we can decide if SFM is a good TL card.
I play it myself in a affinity kind of deck. But I admit I haven’t played that deck much (yet). And I prefer to search for sword of the meek combo.
It’s better if you have etched champion, because survival of your creatures is essential in these decks.
The swords that see play, I guess all 4 of them (body and mind is banned).
depends on the colors and commander they are playing.
Fire Ice certainly, for card draw. That’s very important. and shooting 2 damage is always killing a creature.
Our meta is really focused on creature removal and anti creature removal (hexproof, protection,…)
People need to play the anti hexproof land main (and they do).
So black decks also run sacrifice effects.
That’s why Ezuri has almost no chance here.
There is another TL FNM this week, next week and a bigger tournament on the 15th. So I can get to know what others are playing.
Awesome. Can we propose a new forum discussion to aggregate people’s experience of their local meta?
Why don’t you just start one?
I think you nailed it with SoF&I. This card is an absolute house in TL.
Protections: Blue is always good and red is really good in this format.
Draw: repeatable card draw is not so common in the format (another reason to expect to face blue).
Shock: repeated shock is just plain mean.
+2/+2: last and, ok, least, but again, in TL just enough to make you god among weenies.
If I’m running white I’m ALWAYS running SFM and SoF&I, no questions asked. My leader or biggest threat gets a sword, or at worst, I have a 4/4 pro blue/red stoneforge as early as turn 4 spitting fire and drawing cards (usually, of course nothing in MTG is a sure thing).
and on the topic of finance, the original comment, in a way, shows another reason this card could see a bump from the format. The assumption that it’s an auto-include. Lets not forget that a lot of people buying cards and dictating price are not the best designers. How many people are just going to auto-include this card in their deck because it’s CMC fits the bill and they know it’s “just too good?” Maybe 3 games in they realize it might not be worth a slot just to tutor up a lightning greaves and/or champion’s helm, but they already bought the card. Or maybe they don’t realize it. Or maybe it does happen to be worth it.
Long story still long, I agree with the author, If TL takes off, this card’s sellers should benefit.