Beckett Magic: The Gathering TCG Prerelease Hot/Cold List for The Hobbit

Rain of Riches 200/360 – Commander: Bloomburrow, Rare

Rain of Riches creates two Treasure tokens on entry and grants cascade to the first spell each turn cast with Treasure mana, an obvious fit for a set built around a dragon sitting on a mountain of gold.

Smaug the Magnificent has been the most brewed commander from The Hobbit in early EDHREC data, and roughly four out of five of those decklists include a copy.

The Bloomburrow printing was trading near a dollar in early July and now carries a market price around $5.

The card has also been printed in Streets of New Capenna and Outlaws of Thunder Junction Commander decks, so there is real supply out there.

*Buy Rain of Riches cards on eBay and TCGPlayer

Dwarven Recruiter 186/350 – Odyssey, Uncommon

Mark Rosewater’s July teaser mentioned Dwarf typal support and the market moved before a single Dwarf had been previewed.

Dwarven Recruiter is the Dwarf answer to Goblin Recruiter, stacking any number of Dwarves on top of your library, and it has spent two decades without an archetype to live in.

The Odyssey printing was trading under $2 in June and has climbed to a market price around $10.

The List reprint has run even harder in percentage terms, up over 700 percent for the month, though it still sits cheaper at roughly $6.

*Buy Dwarven Recruiter cards on eBay and TCGPlayer

Elves of Deep Shadow 161/306 – Ravnica: City of Guilds, Common

Smaug is getting the headlines, but Thranduil is right behind him in early brewing data, and the Woodland Realm elves are pulling mana dorks along with them.

Elves of Deep Shadow taps for black mana at the cost of a point of life, and roughly half of the Thranduil lists being built include one.

The Ravnica printing has jumped over the last week to a market price near $6, though the cheapest copies are still listed around $2. The spread here is wide.

It is also worth noting this card was not sitting idle before The Hobbit, it sees maindeck Pauper play in Balustrade Spy shells and turns up in high level cEDH lists.

That existing demand floor is what separates it from a pure hype spike.

*Buy Elves of Deep Shadow cards on eBay and TCGPlayer

Mastermind Plum 3/252 – Ravnica: Clue Edition, Rare

Mastermind Plum draws a card whenever you cast a spell using Treasure mana, comes from the niche Ravnica: Clue Edition release, and has posted an eye watering weekly gain on the trackers.

Look closer and the numbers do not agree with each other. The average asking prices has been repriced up into the teens, but the cheapest Near Mint copies on TCGplayer are still sitting around a dollar.

When the average ask and the cheapest available copy are that far apart, you are usually looking at a thin supply repricing rather than genuine adoption.

The deckbuilding data backs up the skepticism. Inclusion rates in the black Smaug builds are running really low, and Smaug, Wicked Worm is not attracting much interest as a commander at all.

*Buy Mastermind Plum cards on eBay and TCGPlayer

The One Ring 246/281 – The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth, Mythic Rare

Every corner of the Tolkien market is rallying right now, and The One Ring is not participating.

The original Tales of Middle-earth printing sits at a market price around $106 and has been flat for the week, up only about 3 percent on the month, which is well below its all-time high near $150.

Two things work against it. The card is being reprinted with Hobbit era art in the set’s eternal legal companion release, and while that borderless version is currently pre-selling above the original rather than undercutting it, more copies are more copies.

Second, when a card goes sideways during the exact window its franchise is running hot, that relative weakness is information.

None of this makes The One Ring a bad card. It remains one of the most played artifacts in the game. But as a growth position heading into a reprint, the risk is pointed in one direction.

*Buy The One Ring cards eBay and TCGPlayer