Duel Decks Anthology announced: a precedent set?

This week Wizards announced Duel Decks: Anthologies. A cool new boxset with the first four Duel Decks that were ever printed. Nice huh? But does Wizards set a precedent with this reprint?

This reprint is a first time thing: for the first time Wizards is reprinting a limited reprint set. The direct effect: new reprints of noteworthy cards will become available for traders, speculators and players. And without affecting the Standard format (since these sets are not legal in standard). In other words, a great way to reprint cards that are unfit to end up in today's standard tournaments again.

 

A precedent: what's next?

By reprinting Duel Decks, Wizards is setting a precedent for other Duel Decks to be reprinted. And what about the Commander sets? Or from the Vault? Another reprint of FTV: 20 will mean that, for instance, Jace, the Mind Sculptor can be reprinted again?

Maybe they will reprint other sets too, maybe they'll stop at Duel Decks. Anyhow, it's an interesting development. We know that Wizards is trying to impact prices for Modern staples by reprinting on a large scale with, for instance, Modern Masters. DD: Anthologies is also a great way to make certain staples more available to players with a tight(er) budget.

 

Noteworthy reprints

Precedents aside, all four decks have some noteworthy reprints that I would like to share with you:

 

From Duel Decks Chandra vs. Jace

 

Chandra sees no competitive play, but has a high collectors' and casual value. It's price around $9 from DD and around $4.50 is pretty high, considering the large amount of reprints already. 

  

 

Jace Beleren is more popular than Chandra Nalaar, and also sees fringe play in Modern (faeries), but it is not a competitive staple. The price on this card has been going up since the start of 2014, and will probably go down a little after another reprint. 

  

 

Ancestral Vision is a Legacy staple. It's an important card in BUG Control, which uses the cascade keyword to it's advantage. The reprinting of this card is significant, because in this way Wizards is increasing the supply in an Legacy staple, without reprinting it in either 1). a standard legal set or 2). another duel deck or collectors' set. 

 

From Duel Decks Chandra vs. Jace

 

 

Imperious Perfect has strong casual appeal, but has not moved in price a lot over the past 2 years. A reprint is not going to have a lot of impact, but in Elves vs. Goblins it's one of the most valuable cards.

  

 

Same story as Imperious Perfect. Has casual appeal, makes goblins cheaper and more aggressive. Price is rather low already.

 

Divine vs. Demonic

 

 

Demonic Tutor is getting another reprint! This card is even restricted in Vintage, and that says something. In Legacy it's banned. But it's allowed to be played in Commander, so that gives the card some appeal. And the new art reprint is actually more valuable than the revised version. With this reprint, the card becomes more available for both vintage and commander players, which might drop the price a little. On the other hand, there is little trade in this card, so most people will tend to hold on to their copies. 

  

 

Angels are popular and are always big business. This reprint will be foil and (probably) have the same art as it's DD predecessor. So that might affect the price on the original printing.   

 

From Garruk vs. Liliana

 

 

Apparently, one cannot print enough Garruk Wildspeakers. This planeswalker has been reprinted in 4 separate instances and now gets its 5th reprint. But the price is still going up, and for most copies it has doubled its price since january 2014.

Garruk sees modern play, and with this reprinting, wizards is making a staple more available without putting it back in Standard. 

 

 

Liliana Vess wins from Garruk concerning the number of reprints. Liliana is up for her 6th reprint and is even in M15, making her Standard legal. And she is powerful in Standard and sees a lot of play. 

All printings (except the media promo; $22) are around the $10 mark. Vess has been increasing in price since up until may 2014, and is now stable around that $10 mark. The M15 reprint has stopped further price increase. 

Chances are that because of that this reprint won't affect the price of the regular lorwyn and core set prints too much. Any price drop will be because M15 was just released and many packs are going to be opened over the coming months, adding to the supply on the market. A reprint of a existing foil won't add too much to that.