If you’re playing magic on a budget, one of the first and most important lessons you need to learn is that there is definitely a right and a wrong time to buy cards. I’m here to help you see when the right time to buy those cards is. Every week I’ll bring you a cheap pickup from Standard, Modern, Legacy, and Casual formats, plus an extra wildcard pick that I think is worth looking at. These will be good cards, often proven staples in their respective formats. They won’t be cards that have taken a sharp nosedive in value for any reason. What I will be showing you are great pickups that are sitting at a 3-5 year low, and things that you may not have realised are as cheap as they currently are.

So, without further ado, here is my first handful of weekly cheap pickups.

Standard

My cheap standard pickup for this week is Sorin, Grim Nemesis from Shadows over Innistrad.

Sorin is a very playable planeswalker.He has seen a decent level of success throughout his tenure in standard, and personally I think his best days are still ahead of him. He’s not set to rotate anytime soon, and he is currently the cheapest he has ever been.

TCGplayer mid price (before international shipping): $8.27 (£6.28)

Available from Troll Trader today for: £6.72

Modern

This week’s cheap pickup for modern is Thoughtseize from Theros.

Thoughtseize is a multiformat all-star and has been a staple in modern ever since the format was created. The Theros reprint gave players an opportunity to pick it up at a far more accessible price point than the $50-$60 the Lorwyn version was previously commanding. However, unsurprisingly, the card quickly proved to be extremely powerful in standard, and the price quickly rose. Today, you can pick Thoughtseize up for its lowest price since it was reprinted in Theros. The current price is very close to what it was at around the time that Theros was being opened for drafts. I’d be shocked to see such a powerful modern staple sink lower than this.

TCGplayer mid price (before international shipping): $14.39 (£10.96)

Available from Troll Trader today for: £11.16 (LP copies available at £10.60)

Legacy

This week’s cheap legacy pickup is Entomb from Eternal Masters.

Entomb has been a staple for all kinds of reanimator decks ever since its first printing in Odyssey back in 2001. Since then it has been printed as a DCI promo, and in the Graveborn premium deck. Both of those versions obviously had very limited supply, and neither had a massive impact on the card’s price. Thanks to the EMA reprint, you can now pick up Entomb for below $15 for the first time in nearly 5 years. This isn’t likely to get another reprint any time soon, so now is a great time to pick them up if you need them, or if you have been waiting for the right time to buy into legacy reanimator staples.

TCGplayer mid price (before international shipping): $15.28 (£11.64)

Available from Troll Trader today for: £12.06

Casual

The cheap casual pickup for this week is Toxin Sliver from Legions.

Its price picked up when the “new” slivers were printed in M14, and even before then it commonly commanded a price well above $10. Today it sits at its lowest price in 5 years, and can be acquired for $7-8. If this is something you’re missing for a casual sliver deck, or an EDH deck, now is a great time to pick it up.

TCGplayer mid price (before international shipping): $7.36 (£5.61)

Available from Troll Trader today for: £5.86

Wildcard

We’ve already discussed Entomb, but my wildcard pick for this week is every playable rare in eternal masters!

The total value of Eternal Masters is dominated by a few big money mythics in Force of Will, Mana Crypt and Karakas. Compare those to the big ticket mythics of previous “masters” sets and there is a big difference—only one of those is frequently played as more than a 1 or 2-of in its respective format.

Now that most EMA product has been opened, the market is awash with Crypts and Karakas. As stores struggle to move them in meaningful numbers, their prices are likely to settle and not rise for a long time. But this is MTG finance, and when supply of a set is limited, something ALWAYS goes up. For my money, that’s going to be all of the great legacy playable rares (and lower value mythics) in the set.

Those include (but are not limited to):

 Sylvan Library

 Shardless Agent

 Argothian Enchantress

 Maze of Ith

 Sensei’s Divining Top

 Wasteland

 Gamble

 The Tutor Cycle

If you need any of those cards, now is the time to pick them up. We are comfortably past the point of peak supply for EMA, and none of the above cards are likely to see another reprint for a very longtime.

*All prices and currency conversions are correct as of 04/08/2016