Random MTG Common SPIKES 1600% Thanks To Final Fantasy

Last updated on May 13, 2025

Terra from Dissidia Final Fantasy – Designed by Tetsuya Nomura

Final Fantasy reveals are in full swing right now, and the Magic market is taking notice, sometimes pushing forgotten MTG cards from zero to hero in a matter of days. Two weeks ago it was Y'shtola, Night's Blessed sending Helm of the Ghastlord through the roof – and now a batch of Final Fantasy x MTG cards revealed last weekend is doing the same for an obscure green instant from the original Innistrad: Moonmist.

A fairly mediocre green card for a fringe archetype just jumped a mind-blowing 1600% in price, shooting from around 25 cents to well over $4. And a quick glance at its price chart makes it obvious that most of the copies were traded last Sunday, just one day after this Universes Beyond crossover debuted last Saturday the 10th.

Source: TCGplayer – Moonmist (ISD), near-mint

But as it turns out, Moonmist‘s price spike has nothing to do with wolves or werewolves – and all to do with humans.

Why Is Final Fantasy Spiking Moonmist Through the Clouds?

Cloud, Ex-SOLDIER – Illustration by Justyna Dura

The reveals from last Saturday, along with Matt Tabak's official article MTG—Final Fantasy mechanics, confirmed the trend we saw with earlier FF reveals like Zenos yae Galvus: quite a few cards from the upcoming MTG set will be transforming double-faced cards (TDFC).

“Each transforming double-faced card (or TDFC) has two card faces; the front face features a single up arrow symbol in the upper-left corner, and the back face features a single down arrow symbol in the upper-right corner,” explains Tabak in their FF rules article. “When you cast a TDFC, you cast it as the front face, and it enters the battlefield with its front face up.” Then each TDFC has further instructions on how you can transform it to its backside.Take Kefka, Court Mage: You spend , and you get to transform it into Kefka, Ruler of Ruin

Or Ultimecia, Time Sorceress: Pay and exile eight cards from your graveyard, and she turns into Ultimecia, Omnipotent, giving you a whole extra turn as cherry on top.

And what has Moonmist has to do with all of this? On their front side, Kefka and Ultimececia are humans… And Moonmist causes any double-faced Human to transform, not just Werewolves!

This means that with just , on you get to flip any TDFC that happens to be a human on the front – and you do it at instant speed, even in cases like  Kefka, Court Mage‘s that you'd normally have to transform at sorcery speed. At the time of writing, Final Fantasy has revealed 11 such TDFCs, all of which you can flip with Moonmist. And with more reveals until May 30th, there could be more transforming humans.

Another reason for Moonmist‘ price spike is scarcity. Although a common card, it's a fairly rare common: outside of its original Innistrad version (which was released well over a decade ago), it has only been reprinted in The List bonus sheet.

And the third reason is: MTG speculators saw this one coming!

A Telegraphed Spike

The mtgfinance subreddit was well aware of Moonmist's potential even before last Saturday's reveals, noting its scarcity and how unlikely it is to be reprinted after being skipped in Innistrad Remastered last January. Back then it was not entirely clear if Moonmist was a good bet – only a couple of the FF cards revealed at that point were TDFC humans – and doubts remained even as the the reveals went live.

But then on Sunday the MTG playerbase caught wind of this trend, with a thread on the main MTG subreddit getting thousands of upvotes, followed by an extremely popular vid by AttackOnCardboard directing all eyes towards Moonmist:

In other works, the perfect storm for a price spike: Under-printed common suddenly works with a wildly anticipated new set; and now the MTG community hurries to buy every copy in sight.

Sorin Hates This Moon…

Before you hurry up to buy yours, though, two rules interactions to keep in mind.

First, Moonmist straight-up kills TDFC humans that are planeswakers on the other side!

If anybody plays Moonmist while Sorin of House Markov is in play, it will immediately transform into Sorin, Ravenous Neonate. Thing is, planeswalkers get their loyalty counters when they enter the battlefield as a replacement effect, but transforming does not count as entering the battlefield (that's why Sorin's regular transformation tells you to exile it, and then return it transformed). So if you flip Sorin with Moonmist, he'll transform with zero loyalty counters and die on the spot.

Something similar, although a lot less grizzly, happens if you transform a human that is a saga creature on its other side, like Terra, Magical Adept or Clive, Ifrit's Dominant.

Sagas also get their first lore counter when entering the battlefield, so if you flip Terra, Magical Adept with Moonmist you'll get Esper Terra with zero lore counters.

What Will Happen With Moonmist's Price?

Y'shtola, Night's Blessed – Illustration by Magali Villeneuve

“Not sure [Moonmist] will have legs unless we get something very busted that it can flip,” notes u/Marnus71 in one of the financial threads discussing the card's potential. “Likely too narrow for commander unless we get a green flip legend that is bonkers.” Other skeptics note that, being a common, there may be a lot of players that never bothered listing their dozen of copies just to make a couple of bucks – but if we're talking $4 bucks a pop, those dozens of idle copies may start moving soon.

The comparison that comes to mind is Helm of the Ghastlord spike thanks to Y'shtola, Night Blessed. Helm of the Ghastlord is an uncommon with a single print in an old set (Shadowmoor in this case), and the high prices have held even when the enchantment has synergy with a just one Final Fantasy commander.

Then again, folks, this is not investment advice (always do your own research!). Just be advised that Moonmist is on the rise!