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Browse > Home / Strategy / Articles / Weekly Update (May 24): Double Masters

Weekly Update (May 24): Double Masters



Double Masters Previews


Wizards announced the Double Masters this week, a Masters set releasing August 7, 2020 featuring double the number of rares and foils per pack!


Banned and Restricted Update, May 18, 2020: Lurrus Banned in Older Formats


Lurrus banned in Legacy and Vintage, Zirda banned in Legacy.Read more


Budget Magic: Escape Protocol Lock (Standard)


Can we lock opponents out of the game in Standard with Escape Protocol on just a $60 budget? Let's find out!Read more


Finance Update w/ Saffron Olive


Mana Crypt Underrealm Lich Brand

This week, the biggest finance news was the announcement of the return of Masters sets with Double Masters releasing this summer. So far, the handful of cards that have been previewed — Mana Crypt, Blightsteel Colossus, Doubling Season, Atraxa, Praetors' Voice and Kaalia of the Vast — have all been high-value mythics. In some ways Double Masters is a mixture between Mystery Booster and a Masters set, with 40 mythics and 121 rares making the size of the set much larger than a traditional Masters set. This increased set size will likely limit the impact that being reprinted has on some of the most valuable cards in the set. Rather than having an individual mythic show up once in every five boxes as it would in a traditional set, for Double Masters it will take slightly more than 13 boxes to open one copy of each mythic. While Double Masters should still help bring down card prices, the decline will be split up between a much higher number of cards, so rather than a few cards decreasing a lot in price, we'll likely end up in a situation where many cards decrease a smaller amount. 

Meanwhile in Standard, the biggest winner this week was Underrealm Lich, which more than doubled in price to $8. While the Golgari legend doesn't see much Standard play, it has developed into a Commander staple. As a result, it's unlikely that the price of Underrealm Lich will drop much at rotation, so if you need a copy, you might as well pick it up. As a mythic that sees heavy Commander play, Underrealm Lich has the look of a card that will keep slowly increasing in price until it is eventually reprinted in a Commander-focused supplemental product.

Finally we have what might be Magic's first meme buyout in Brand, with the Urza's Saga rare more than doubling from $1.50 to $4. Over the last few weeks, Brand has been a running joke on Magic social media, with players asking why it wasn't reprinted in Ikoria as a cycling answer to Agent of Treachery. This newfound notoriety has apparently lead to people purchasing the card, which in turn drives up the price. At first I thought Gavi, Nest Warden was responsible, but according to EDHRec, only 3% of Gavi decks bother to play Brand, so that seems unlikely. On the other hand, Brand is as cheap as its effect can be, and it even cycles as a bonus. These are the kinds of cards that eventually end up fitting in some deck or another, so perhaps the instant does have some long-term potential. Regardless, it's probably best just to ignore the price increase. If you need a copy of Brand for something like Gavi, Nest Warden it's still only $4 and if it ever does become prohibitively expensive, it can easily be reprinted since it isn't on the Reserved List.

Much Abrew: Five-Color Umori-One (Modern)

Single Scoop: Kykar and The Apex of Thunder

Can an all-creature version of Hollow One work in Modern so we can take advantage of Umori, the Collector as a companion? Let's find out! Read more

Kykar and Vadrok. Are they the Jeskai tag team duo we need? TheAsianAvenger sure hopes so! Read more


The Expected Value of Ikoria


Ikoria is finally being released in paper, but how much value should you expect to open from your booster box? Let's delve into the numbers and find out!Read more

This Week in Legacy: Companion, Interrupted

Theorycrafting Historic Anthology 3

Joe Dyer analyzes the impact of the BnR announcement on 5/18 and how it affects Legacy going forward. Read more

Excited for the new Historic Anthology 3 cards? TheAsianAvenger has a few decklist starting points for the new cards hitting MTG:Arena. Read more


Against the Odds: Companion Tribal Fakeout (Standard)


Companions are broken, so playing as many as possible should make our deck really, really broken. Right?Read more

Vintage 101: The Final Cat's Meow

Fish Five-0: Mono White Bogles (Standard)

Joe Dyer discusses the banning of Lurrus in Vintage! Read more

TheAsianAvenger takes out the new hotness in Mono White Bogles that is also extremely budget friendly! Read more


Symbiotic Swarm (Abzan Graveyard Keywords) Commander 2020 Precon Upgrade | $20, $200 | Budget Commander


Tune Symbiotic Swarm into a tuned, powerful Keyword Soup deck fueled by the graveyard!Read more

The Fish Tank: Sweet and Spicy User Decks (May 17-23, 2020)

Historic 101: Azorius Steel

What cool decks did viewers submit this week? Let's find out! Read more

Where were you when the robots attacked Historic?!?!? Watching this video, of course. Read more


Commander Clash S8 E5: Companion Week w/ Joseph Schultz (EDHREC) | Keruga vs. Lurrus vs. Obosh vs. Zirda


How busted are companions in Commander? The Goldfish Crew enlists the help of EDHREC's Joseph Schultz to find out!Read more

The Web of Playability

Podcast 277: Vintage and Legacy Bans, New Promos and CommandFest

How can you make the right card choices for your decks in an efficient and easy manner? With the help of the web of playability! What is the web and how can you use it to improve your deck building? Let's discuss! Read more

The crew breaks down today's banned and restricted announcement, some upcoming promos and CommandFest Online before answering #MTGFishmail. Read more


Instant Deck Techs


Each day we'll be posting a short, three minute deck tech featuring some of the coolest decks that come across the site. The most popular deck will be made into videos the following week based on your views, likes and comments in the videos. Here's this week's Instant Deck Techs:



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