Movers and Shakers - Battle of Whtz

Battle of Wits | Art by Jason Chan

Whtz up? Not much, just looking over the new Mystery Booster Commander Edition cards...

With the reveal of dozens of cards from MBC, Commander players everywhere are looking for the best cards to pair with the rulebreaker commanders that allow some of the format's core rules to be ignored. There's new commanders that let you include Angels of any color in a deck, there's sorceries that can live in your command zone, and there's even a mono-color multi-color Otter! This set is really wacky, folks.

But we're not here to talk about the price of the rulebreaker cards. They're not even in players' hands yet! Instead, we're here to talk about a card that's seen its price skyrocket due to the upcoming release of a certain Homunculus. Today's article is about Battle of Wits! Let's jump right in...

What Does This Card Do?

For , Battle of Wits is an an enchantment that wins us the game on our upkeep if we've got more than 200 cards in our library. It was first printed all the way back in October 2001's Odyssey, and has seen three reprints and a Secret Lair printing since then.

Transparently, this card doesn't have much use in current day Magic. Commander has a strict requirement of 100 cards (99 + one commander, with some exceptions), making Battle of Wits essentially blank in the game's fastest-growing format. We're out of luck in other formats, too. Battle of Wits is legal in Modern, Legacy, and Vintage, and those formats don't have a deck size maximum (just a 60-card main deck minimum), but most players are unwilling to dilute their deck with cards that don't fit their strategy, making it less likely that they'll draw powerful, game-state-appropriate cards when they're needed.

Because of its technically-legal-but-unplayable status across multiple formats, Battle of Wits has rotted in bulk bins for months! But, that's all changing now...

Why Is This Card's Price Rising Now?

One of the most interesting cards from Mystery Booster Commander Edition is Whtz, the Bibliophile. It's a 1/3 for that removes the deck size restriction! Thanks to their rulebreaker ability, we can have as many cards in our deck as we please. We can also pay (or, usually, ) and Whtz to draw a card and gain one life.

This Homunculus' color identity is also of note. Because Whtz gives us access to , we can use tutors to fetch up Battle of Wits from our huge library. Given how many cards are in our deck, it's unlikely that we'll naturally draw into any one card. Most Whtz players will include well over 200 cards in their deck to ensure that Battle of Wits can provide us with a victory on our upkeep at any stage of the game. Given that fact, spells like Enlightened Tutor, Idyllic Tutor and even Moon-Blessed Cleric are already popular on Whtz' EDHREC page.

Speaking of EDHREC, its data shows that Battle of Wits is in a full two-thirds of Whtz decks! As of the time of writing, the enchantment is in 1,830 of 2,760 eligible decks led by this rulebreaker. That number will likely increase even further when Whtz becomes available in paper.

How Has This Card's Market Changed?

Before Whtz got revealed as part of the lead up to Mystery Booster Commander Edition, Battle of Wits was sitting at a low price point. Average sales of normal, non-Secret-Lair printings of the card were selling for just $0.23. The Secret Lair edition, which has an admittedly cool depiction of a scene from The Princess Bride, was much more expensive. Our data shows that copies sold for an average of $2.86, more than 10 times the price of the base version.

There were just three transactions involving Battle of Wits between March 21st and August 2nd of this year. After the release of Whtz on August 3rd, though, the tides changed. Cardsphere's data shows massive trade volume for this enchantment, with 29 copies being traded in the week between August 3rd and August 10th. The amount of sales has increased by a whopping 867%, and will likely continue trending upwards well after players get their hands on MBC packs at upcoming conventions.

Normal printings of the card, from Magic 2013, Zendikar Rising's The List, 9th Edition, and The Odyssey had an average index price of $1.19! That's an increase of 417%, but that does include a foil version of the card from Odyssey that was listed for $21.38. If we remove that obvious outlier, the average index price is still up at $0.38. That more statistically sound number represents a 65% increase from its pre-Mystery-Booster number.

We're seeing a similar pattern in the Secret Lair printing's price. A foil copy was recently indexed for $4.85, while two non-foils were just listed for $4.05 each. That's an average of $4.32, or a 51% increase from before the reveals. It's notable that a non-foil Wallace-Shawn-centric printing of this card is currently selling for 10.7 times more than a non-foil, regular printing. That's certainly a large ask. But, for a deck that's likely to be centered around this enchantment, I'd certainly spring for the Princess Bride version. It'd be inconceivable not to.

What Might Be Next for This Card's Price?

It's highly unlikely that we'll see another card like Whtz. The fine folks over at Wizards of the Coast don't frequently break the core rules of Commander. I get the impression that Mystery Booster Commander Edition is a one-off, not a pattern that's likely to be repeated.

Additionally, as fun as the Bibliophile is likely to be as a deck leader, Whtz doesn't solve the problems facing Battle of Wits in other formats. It remains legal yet largely ignored in all 60-card formats. Outside of extremely niche Yorion, Sky Nomad companion decks, Battle of Wits is without a firm foothold in non-Commander gameplay. Other cards that rely heavily on one commander sometimes see their price drop after that commander's initial popularity. Unless Whtz becomes one of the format's most popular commanders, which I think is a long shot, Battle of Wits is probably going to see its price settle somewhere below its current mark.