The Biggest Magic: The Gathering Crashers and Climbers This Week – July 29
The Magic: The Gathering Final Fantasy Universes Beyond set is drawing to a close (at least until Spider-Man’s arrival), with Edge of Eternities debuting in just a few days.
The new sci-fi set will take us to space, and there are new synergies emerging already. This week’s movers and shakers include cards with spaceships and aliens in mind, thanks to data from TCGPlayer.
Climbers: Return of The Gaffer
Players have already spotted a lot of potential in The Gaffer, a three-cost white card who turns lifegain into card advantage.
This card from The Lord of the Rings is seeing a climb ahead of Edge of Eternities, reaching $9 and up, thanks to synergies with Ragost, Deft Gastronaut. It was just $2 not long ago.
Next up, we mentioned Thrumming Hivepool last week, and Hatchery Sliver is another shoo-in for Sliver decks with Edge of Eternities. It’s slithered its way to over $10 pretty quickly.
Sticking with Slivers, The First Sliver from Modern Horizons saw a steep drop but has now started to pick up. Giving your Sliver spells Cascade, and offering a 7/7 body in its own right, it’s likely to be a nuisance to play against, and it’s now $30.
The last Edge of Eternities synergy this week is Sylvan Safekeeper, which plays on the land sacrificing theme of the World Shaper Commander precon. It’s up to $8 and climbing.
Finally, it wouldn’t be a Crashers and Climbers without something to do with the Tidus deck, and this week it’s Wave Goodbye, which sends a board’s worth of cards back to an owner’s hand if their cards don’t have a counter on them.
Crashers: Big Beasts and Baddies
This week’s crashers are well worth a look for just about anyone. First up, Summon: Primal Odin from Final Fantasy is now under $2. Given you can manipulate his lore counters with the right setup, you can keep Zantetsuken primed to deal game-ending damage to players.
One more Final Fantasy one, and it’s Ultima, Origin of Oblivion. This 4/4 could be an ideal inclusion in colorless decks since it gets you double colorless mana, but it also ‘blights’ an opponent’s land. It’s just a dollar.
Next up, we switch our focus to Dragons. Tarkir: Dragonstorm remains one of my favorite sets of this year, and Betor, Kin to All was arguably a better inclusion in the Abzan Armor deck than Betor, Ancestor’s Voice. Now you can right that wrong for under $4.
Sticking with alternative versions of Commanders from the set’s precons, Ureni, the Song Unending is down to under $3 and could be devastating if you can pull enough lands before introducing it.
Finally, Craterhoof Behemoth’s Showcase Halo Foil version is one of the priciest cards in the set, but you can get this big bad beast for around $12-$15 in its standard printing.
Lloyd Coombes is an experienced freelancer in tech, gaming and fitness seen at Polygon, Eurogamer, Macworld, TechRadar and many more. He’s a big fan of Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games, much to his wife’s dismay.
