The Lord of the Rings MTG card The Gaffer has shot up in price over the past couple of weeks, with a 316% rise in the last 10 days. On July 15, this card cost just $3, but now copies are selling for as much as $12.50.
The Gaffer comes from the excellent Food and Fellowship Commander precon deck - one of the best that Wizards has created. In his natural habitat, The Gaffer's ability to draw a card each end step where you gained three or more life in the turn pairs well with all the food tokens the deck creates.
However, there's a new Universes Beyond card causing The Gaffer to spike: Hope Estheim from the Final Fantasy set.
While this card hasn't received as much attention as creatures like Cloud, Y'shtola, or Sephiroth, Hope has a really unique theme, pairing lifelink with mill in Azorius colors. This has led to lots of cards which only exist to provide an enormous amount of lifegain ramping up in value, such as Beacon of Immortality.
The reason The Gaffer is such a strong card alongside Hope is that both benefit from you gaining life on other players' turns. It's pretty decent even if you're only drawing an extra card on your own turn, but paired with cards like Soul Warden and Authority of the Consuls you can often get two or three cards per turn cycle out of The Gaffer. And, of course, Hope will be gently milling your opponents to death all the while.
Since you need to dedicate quite a lot of a Hope Esheim Commander deck to both mill cards and lifelink, you don't have as much space for card draw, and need to stick to the most efficient options. Providing repeatable card draw for three mana, with a ceiling of four cards in one circuit of the table, The Gaffer is among your best options.
It's surprising how sudden this card's price movements have been, given that Final Fantasy has been out for close to a month now. My guess is that the fairly limited supply has now started to run out, causing this sudden uptick.
Have you played with or against Hope? I'd love to hear if it was any fun - let me know at the Wargamer Discord. You should also check out the MTG release schedule, and our guide to the best MTG commanders.