Over and Underhill - Tales of Middle-earth

With prerelease weekend having come and gone, it’s that time of the quarter again…set release week! The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth (LTR) has begun to hit the market in full force, and with it key cards both new and old are starting to wind up in players’ hands.

Whether you’re excited for potential new-to-Magic staples (*cough* Orcish Bowmasters *cough*) or a bevy of reskinned reprints courtesy of the Realms and Relics promotion, LTR is set to satisfy players across formats. But when something shakes up the meta, you can bet that market waves won’t be far off. So let’s take a look and see what’s over and what’s under.

Before we travel out of the Magic Multiverse and into the Tolkien Estate, let’s start things off with a quick recap of last month’s selections. 

Review: Ally-Colored Fetchlands

Since we last dropped in on these Khans of Tarkir allstars, each of the Ally Fetchlands have begun to either trend downwards or sideways, with the weakening prices outnumbering those which are otherwise stable. While there is no immediate indication for a reprint (fingers crossed for Commander Masters, perhaps…), the momentary softening of the market does indicate that the Ally Fetchlands may have hit a price ceiling, with downwards trends being a cooling-off period after what has otherwise been a strong year for these staples. If you can wait to pick them up, then I highly encourage you to do so, as it looks like cheaper Fetchlands may be on the horizon.

Review: Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer

Similar to last month’s overvalued picks, Ragavan also appears to have stabilized in the wake of a recent cooling off period. What was once an $80 chase card has been slashed in half, with the March of the Machine: Multiverse Legends printing going for almost $40 on the open market. Certainly a desirable card, no doubt, but the market has become far more saturated thanks to its inclusion in a Standard-release product. Unlike the Fetchlands, however, Ragavan seems to have found its bottom, making conditions just right for a value acquisition, if you haven’t done so already.

Now, with our review out of the way, on to this month’s overvalued pick.

Cavern of Souls

Cavern of Souls is a very, very desirable card. From competitive to casual, this land is ubiquitous across any creature type-centric deck which can afford a copy (or several). Couple that with its relatively exclusive printings (Avacyn Restored, Double Masters 2022, Ultimate Masters, and Modern Masters 2017), and you’ve got the makings of one expensive Magic card. That all being said, why would this be a contender for an overpriced pick? It has a proven price floor, sustained demand, and a secured roll across plenty of formats and playstyles.

Enter the Realms and Relics promotion. For a bit of context, each LTR booster box (Draft, Set, and Collector) will contain a box topper from among several notable artifacts and lands, each with new art and frames highlighting the world of Middle-earth. These printings will also be available in Collector Booster packs, meaning that, while they'll certainly be desirable and sought after, they won’t be terribly exclusive. In essence, this is another run of special insert cards akin to the Zendikar Rising Expeditions – guaranteed one per box, with the occasional extra appearing in Collector packs.

While specialty inserts like these haven’t historically had a substantial impact on the price of the base card, it is nonetheless important to note that, when done at a large enough scale, they do exert a downwards pressure on the market, especially for the “base” version of cards (e.g. the standard border treatment printings in Ultimate Masters, Double Masters 2022, etc.).

This brings us back to the valuation question for Cavern of Souls, which is directly linked to the scale of this new promotion. If these Realms and Relics cards were only available in Collector products, it would be a vastly different story, but thanks to their availability as box toppers in Draft and Set products – two product lines which Wizards of the Coast print multiple waves of during each release – we can expect to see a lot of box toppers hit the market. The more in-demand LTR is, the more of it will be printed, and the more we will see of Cavern of Souls. As such, while Cavern of Souls appears stable for now, I wouldn’t be surprised to see its price erode over the next month or two.

Next, also courtesy of LTR, it’s time to talk about our undervalued pick.

Cavern of Souls	CardKingdom $47.99	TCGPlayer $42.17
Cavern of Souls	CardKingdom $44.99	TCGPlayer $42.06
Cavern of Souls	CardKingdom $47.99	TCGPlayer $43.83

Wheel of Fortune

Oh boy, a Reserved List card in 2023? How could this possibly be making waves!? Weak vintage markets, nonexistent buyouts, and a general malaise for anything even tangentially 30th Anniversary Edition; these aren’t exactly the conditions which spell success, even for the most tried-and-true assets. So, why is Wheel of Fortune suddenly getting attention?

Well, this time it's (almost) entirely for play reasons, primarily with respect to Commander (more specifically, cEDH). As I briefly mentioned at the top of this article, LTR brought with it a doozy of a card via Orcish Bowmasters. This two-mana creature does a lot of things, but as far as we’re concerned it punishes wheel effects very harshly. In a four-player game, resolving a Wheel of Fortune with an Orcish Bowmasters in play results in twenty-one damage triggers as well as amassing a gigantic Orc Army token in the process.

While this might sound like doom and gloom for any player attempting to wheel against the Orcish Bowmasters player, the flip side is that this card also rewards decks which aggressively force their opponents to draw multiple cards in a turn. For those of you who played cEDH back when Hullbreacher was legal, this might bring flashbacks of aggressive wheel-based decks such as Opus Thief, a strategy which hinged on punishers like Hullbreacher. Hullbreacher has come and gone since then, but the release of Orcish Bowmasters has left plenty of players asking, “could Opus Thief come back?”

While Orcish Bowmasters would certainly be among the stars of the deck, it would nonetheless be supported by an engine of mass card draw effects, with Wheel of Fortune being among the best in show. This extra attention is beginning to catch on and, given that Wheel of Fortune is already among the most playable of Reserved List cards, is already showing signs of real price movement. While Wheel of Fortune isn’t likely to be the next big buyout, it is beginning a bit of a resurgence, something which could pay dividends as the broader market strengthens.

Wheel of Fortune	CardKingdom $329.99	TCGPlayer $281.13
Orcish Bowmasters	CardKingdom $54.99	TCGPlayer $45.00

Wrap Up

Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth is going to make waves in every market it can reach, and it can reach a lot of markets. From casual to competitive, Modern to Commander, there seems to be something in the set for everyone. It’s not just the One of One Ring player’s will be chasing, but reprints and staples, too.

Check out these other articles:

Hidden Gems - Man! I Feel Like a Zombie! by Adam Berg

Modern Times - Tales of Middle-earth by Corey Williams

Dodgy Little Hobbitses by Jason Alt