The Magic: The Gathering card Avatar of Growth has seen a sudden 300% price spike in the past two weeks. This card was selling for just $11 until about September 24, but now copies in good nick are going for $40.
This elemental avatar is a multiplayer card that works a bit like a group hug Primeval Titan. But whereas that's a card on the MTG Commander banlist, Avatar of Growth is far less threatening. Though it fetches you two basic lands (and for three mana in a four-player game) the effect is not repeatable. Worse, it's symmetrical: your opponents get lands too.
Avatar of Growth is one of the exclusive Mythic cards from the very first Game Night beginner product which Wizards launched in 2018. There were five of these cards in total, one for each MTG color, but the green card is by far the most valuable. That's because, of the five, Militant Angel and Inspired Sphinx are no good in Commander, and the others received recent reprints, Rot Hulk in Aetherdrift and Goblin Goliath in Foundations Jumpstart.
But with no reprint yet, Avatar of Growth is obviously in very short supply, which leaves it susceptible to spiking. Yet I'm not sure exactly what set this card in motion…
For starters, I'm not seeing anything from the MTG Spiderman set that could've caused this. I suppose there's some decent interaction with the webslinging ability and the card would be pretty great with Scarlet Spider, Ben Reilly - but that's hardly a popular commander.
And while it's obviously a decent plan to put this in a landfall deck that can make better use of the lands it fetches up, there's no sign on EDHREC that it's seeing any play with the Edge of Eternities Landfall commanders.
Maybe I've missed something and this really should be priced alongside the best MTG cards in Standard; or perhaps this is just a case of a fairly old card with no reprints getting pricier over time? Either way, it's fair to say that Avatar of Growth's $40 price tag is contingent on it not receiving a reprint any time soon.
I personally wouldn't bet on that, given that the other two relevant cards both got reprinted within the last 12 months. In fact, the Avatar The Last Airbender set that's coming up next seems like a pretty fitting spot for this guy, so buyer beware!
If there's a reason this card's spiking that I've not spotted, please come let me know on the Wargamer Discord. You can also check out our guide to the very most expensive MTG cards of all time.