Last updated on March 28, 2025
Deathrite Shaman | Illustration by Steve Argyle
Tarkir: Dragonstorm‘s cards are all the rage right now: This is clearly one of the most anticipated MTG sets in quite some time, with tons of Magic players welcoming the return to a beloved, high-fantasy setting.
But when it comes to the MTG card market, it's not just dragons soaring high!
Deathrite Shaman, one of the most well-known staples across many Magic formats, has jumped a crazy 100%-200% (depending on the print) on the US market, according to MTGStocks.
Source: MTGStocks – Deathrite Shaman (RTR)
TCGplayer shows a similar trend…
Source: TCGPlayer – Deathrite Shaman (RTR)
… also showing the huge number of copies that were sold just this week. So what's going on?
Why is Deathrite Shaman Spiking
Deathrite Shaman | Illustration by Steve Argyle
Short story: Our usual “‘It might come off the banlist' buyout,” says u/Thulack in the most-upvoted reply in the thread where the MTG financial subreddit wonders about why Deathrite Shaman is sold out.
“There’s some speculation it could come off the banlist in Modern or Legacy,” expands u/ckregular. “Tbd if it will, but if it does it will instantly be viewed as a Tier-0 card in either format.”
Financially-minded players were already discussing two weeks ago if it was worth speculating on the card. The majority considered it too long a shot to be worth speculating on, noting that Deathrite Shaman “skews decks in such a way that there is not much deckbuilding cost to either splashing black or green sources to play it,” and as such is an unlikely candidate for unbanning.
But, as the song goes, spec'ers gonna spec, spec, spec, spec, spec. Four days ago retro-frame copies were already being bought out (even when the majority of the MTG financial community still sees it as a trap, with some even advising to sell into the spike), and yesterday most prints were sold out.
Why was Deathrite Shaman Banned?
There are three Deadly Sins when it comes to Magic cards: Broken, Boring, and Bland.
Being broken is the most grievous, and also the most obvious; think Oko, Thief of Crowns. We can usually point at some objective metric like win rate and play rate, and it's clear something's too much of a good thing. Or bad thing, in Oko's case.
And back in June 2018, Deathrite Shaman was plainly guilty of this.
“In recent snapshots of the environment, Grixis Delver showed a 55% (non-mirror-match) win rate against the field,” noted WotC's Ian Duke in the official Banned and Restricted Update. “At Grand Prix Birmingham, eleven of the top sixteen decks used four copies of Deathrite Shaman, including five of the Top 8. When the most popular deck in an environment is also among the most winning decks with a win rate significantly above 50% over a long period of time, we investigate.”
The second deadly sin is being a painful bore to play against. A good example is Nadu, Winged Wisdom: It was not just broken to hell and back for Modern and Commander, its turns took forever to execute. Deathrite Shaman, though, can cast a lot of stones here (or, well, cast a lot of spells; this is a Magic card after all!) and is free of guilt in this regard.
The third deadly sin is the most elusive: Cards that homogenize a format and reduce diversity. Even when the card by itself could be fine in a vacuum, they make the format bland as a whole.
“Over time, we've seen a reduction in diversity of blue-based non-combo decks, with what were once more differentiated aggressive, midrange, and controlling archetypes condensing into a similar core of the strongest cards,” noted Ian Duke. “Deathrite Shaman's powerful mana-fixing capability allows these decks to commonly play up to four colors, choosing from the most efficient cards in the environment.”
This led to a reduction in diversity in the environment, an inability for the metagame to adjust, and a dominant strategy that was particularly hostile to rogue decks and innovation, in turn pushing Deathrite Shaman out of the format.
Top players were on board with this decision.
“I believe that banning Deathrite Shaman needed to be done for the health of the Legacy format,” wrote MTG Hall of Famer Seth Mansfield back then. “We came to a spot where it could be argued all the best decks in Legacy play Deathrite Shaman, and that's a huge red flag.”
Will Deathrite Shaman be Unbanned?
The short, accurate answer is: Only WotC knows what they'll announce next Monday.
There are arguments to be made about how both formats have more answers now, making Deathrite Shaman an okay creature to play. And Deathrite Shaman‘s performance in MTG Arena's Timeless format, where its legal, would give further credence to the stance that Deathrite Shaman would no longer be broken in Legacy or Modern.
But the majority of redditors seem to think it would homogenize the formats too much, making 4-5 color soups too strong.
The folks from the Eternal Durdles podcast ran an interesting series of interviews on the topic – the sample size is very small (just 33 answers), but the results are nevertheless illuminating.
When asked about what they would personally like to see, Deathrite Shaman easily won the “I'd love to see this unbanned card” category, with about 20% of the votes.
Source: The Eternal Durdles podcast
But when asked what they think WotC will actually do…
Source: The Eternal Durdles podcast
… just one player believes it will be unbanned.
Still, as the song says…
Will Deathrite Shaman's Price Keep Going Up? Or Will It Go Down?
Deathrite Shaman | Illustrated by Mark Riddick
As is always the case around here: This is not investment advice, folks – always do your own research!
Having said that, this is as clear-cut a speculative buyout as you can get. It's a fairly safe bet that, if Deathrite Shaman gets unbanned in either Legacy or Modern (let alone both), the price will go up – and that it will return to normal if it stays banned.
Which would mean that somebody with extra copies would sell them this weekend if they were to think Deathrite Shaman is not going to be unbanned, while holding on to them if they were to think it will.
But, until next Monday, we won't really know how this song goes.
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