Weekly Winners 2023 - 25

This may surprise you, but it's actually quite a slow week. The Lord of the Rings sets have been released and now the Interests are cluttered with these cards finding their value, but until then you'll see it fluctuate a bunch.

Like every week, just in time for FNM, I'll tell you about the Magic: the Gathering cards that'll be the talk of the town tonight! Come discuss this week's price movements with us on Discord.

Articles

The past few months we've been focusing on putting out more quality content, and I'd love to share the next few articles with you, since they're worth a read:

• Harvey talks about the currently overvalued and undervalued cards in his article Over and Underhill - Tales of Middle-earth.
• In Dodgy Little Hobbitses: The Two Towers Jason discusses the cards you should pick up for upgrading the new Commander: The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth decks.
• In New Horizons - Lord of the Rings, Matt talks about, you guessed it, Lord of the Rings!
• And in History, Restapled - Walkers This Way Steve gives us a bit of counter-programming, looking at planeswalkers from Phyrexia: All Will Be One.

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Onto the Weekly Winners!

#1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow $5.05 (+121%)

We actually mentioned this card two weeks ago. Back then it was because of Arachnogenesis spiking to $78. While the card has come down a bit in price to a "mere" $65, it does still prove that Spiders will be hot in Commander. Ishkanah, Grafwidow currently is one of the more popular Spider commanders, but with the printing of Shelob, Child of Ungoliant and Shelob, Dread Weaver there are some new toys to play with and, probably to a lesser extent, there's also Mirkwood Spider.

$2.70$3.99

What I find interesting is that even two weeks ago, when we observed the Arachnogenesis spike, Ishkanah, Grafwidow was already on a steady uptrend, but it took a little bit before the actual jump happened. It remains to be seen whether this is actual popular demand, or people jumping on the hype-train to make sure they have their copies in.

Ishkanah, Grafwidow	CardKingdom $4.99	TCGPlayer $5.00
Shelob, Child of Ungoliant	CardKingdom $0.49	TCGPlayer $0.70
Shelob, Dread Weaver	CardKingdom $3.99	TCGPlayer $2.70

#2 The One Ring $58.94 (+84%)

This week a lot of cards from the The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth sets have been showing up. This is not uncommon with a set that was just released, especially one that makes as many waves as this one. Because it's a crossover with a very popular fantasy realm, there are a lot of people who are excited for this set. This leads to several things happening. It's very likely that a bunch of product will be opened of this set, meaning the market will now start to be flooded with cards. With some cards we may see a race-to-the-bottom, for others we may see a different trajectory since people really want to get their hands on certain iconic cards.

Because of this we see the Interests being flooded with these cards, because cards either go up quickly or drop very fast, and it takes a little bit of time for them to find their ultimate price. For this reason I opted to skip as many cards from these sets in this week's Weekly Winners. However, I do feel that The One Ring deserves a place this week. The card obviously is iconic, and has made a lot of waves especially because of the One of One Ring, but it seems like the power level of the card has been somewhat underestimated.

$40.99$64.99

People have been talking about the card, and saying that the card draw obviously is nice but it will slowly kill you. However, you should not skip over the part where it says you have protection from everything until your next turn. When timed properly this can save you a bunch of damage, mitigating the life you will lose from The Ring. Also, since the artifact is Legendary, you can reset it by playing another copy (unless you play Commander). The card has proven so powerful that people are actually testing it in Modern, Legacy, and Vintage. For example we're seeing it show up in Modern Mono-G Tron decks.

The One Ring	CardKingdom $64.99	TCGPlayer $63.99
The One Ring (Extended Art)	CardKingdom $74.99	TCGPlayer $67.62
The One Ring (Borderless)	CardKingdom $64.99	TCGPlayer $40.99

#3 Academy Manufactor $6.69 (+96%)

Here is a card that has spiked not too long ago, around the release of Streets Of New Capenna. It reached its all time high in May 2022 when it was around $9. With all the cards from Throne of Eldraine that are making Food tokens, this can quickly add up. Seeing as how popular Treasure tokens are as well, this card can be a real powerhouse and is a popular include in Commander decks that revolve around one (or mulitple) of these tokens. In Modern we have actually seen this card see play in Urza, Lord High Artificer decks.

In the new The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth we see new cards appear that create Food tokens, and this seems to be the main reason for this card going up again. With more support for a certain token, that means that cards like Academy Manufactor are becoming more relevant. Especially with cards like Galadriel, Gift-Giver, which we also see on this week's Interests list, that can make either of these tokens have a strong synergy with Academy Manufactor.

Academy Manufactor	CardKingdom $7.99	TCGPlayer $6.30
Academy Manufactor	CardKingdom $8.49	TCGPlayer $6.73

Cheap Pickups

Please note: for our 'record low' we consider the price of the card over the past 7 years. Many cards have been even cheaper (a) decade(s) ago. Also note: some cards are still going down, and might be even cheaper pickups next week.

Lyra Dawnbringer $3.97 - Moving up!

Lyra Dawnbringer has been identified by the MTGStocks Premium Penny Stocks feature as a card that has reached its bottom and is starting a consistent uptrend.

Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury $5.49 - Slowly moving down

Hexdrinker $5.15 - Slowly moving down

 

Lyra Dawnbringer	CardKingdom	TCGPlayer $5.15
Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury	CardKingdom $2.99	TCGPlayer $3.53
Hexdrinker	CardKingdom $4.99	TCGPlayer $4.79

 

That's it for this week. Make sure to check back next week for more Weekly Winners!