The Magic: The Gathering creature card Zask, Skittering Swarmlord has grown in value, going from $6 this time last month to a whopping $43. It's all thanks to the Eumidians, alien insects from Edge of Eternities that - just like Zask - also have land-based synergies.
Released in the 2022 Jumpstart MTG set, Zask is a legendary creature that lets you play insects and lands from your graveyard. It also has you mill cards every time one of your bugs gets squashed, and has an activated ability that grants your creepy-crawlies deathtouch.
Ever since its release, Zask, Skittering Swarmlord has been the MTG commander of choice for those who like animals with too many legs, and Edge of Eternities has plenty of new insects to try out alongside it.
In particular, the Commander precon deck World Shaper is full of green and black insects that play nicely with Zask. This card began to spike on July 9, the day World Shaper was previewed by the Command Zone, and if we look at that group's preview video, it's easy to see why that happened.
The Command Zone team put Zask in the 'Cards to Add' section of the reveal, called it "maybe the best card in the deck" and even hinted that the precon's release would cause the card to skyrocket. If that's not music to a Magic card collector's ears, I don't know what is.
We've seen before what a major impact this specific content creator can have on card prices when it 'predicts' a spike. When Aetherdrift came out, The Command Zone was responsible for boosting the Reserved List card Unfulfilled Desires by 900%.
Even if only half of the viewers made it deep in the video and heard the Zask recommendation, that's still some 90,000 people. Most likely, hundreds set out to buy up a card they were told would be spiking.
But interestingly, when we look at the decklists on EDHREC, it seems not that many players are including Zask in either Hearthull or Szarel decks. The Swarmlord is only appearing in 1 out of every 10 decklists.
Looking more closely, I think that's because most players are leaning heavily into the land sacrifice and landfall themes, and are not as interested in the insect tribal synergies. And that's fair enough: apart from the commander, the World Shaper precon only came with five insects.
So I think The Command Zone was actually just wrong to call this the best upgrade for the deck. Which perhaps explains why, after hitting $32 two days after the reveal, Zask slumped to $19. That didn't last long though. It soon picked up steam again, spiking to $43.
In my opinion, you're better off upgrading a Zask deck with the new insect cards from Edge of Eternities than slotting Zask into the 99 of a different shell. And the Eumidians from the main set seem even better than the precon cards.
Icetill Explorer, for instance, lets you play extra lands and gives you mill for lands entering. Seedship Broodtender mills you when you play it and when you sacrifice it for a discount on a Hornet Queen or Giant Adephage.
However you're using your Zask, there's one thing we can all agree. Between Aetherdrift's racing bugs and Edge of Eternities' aliens, insect fans are eating good in 2025.
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