Random Tarkir: Dragonstorm Legendary Surges 300%

Last updated on September 5, 2025

Surrak, Elusive Hunter (Tarkir- Dragonstorm) – art by Dan Scott

Magic's Standard metagame is going through quite the shake-up right now. While Vivi Cauldron decks remain by far the most popular, matchup data from Orlando's Magic Spotlight: Planetary Rotation has shown that the Izzet wizard has weak spots, as Brennan Roy demonstrated by claiming the #1 spot piloting Mono-Red aggro:

“Now that the ways to defeat Izzet Cauldron have been established,” writes Magic Hall of Famer Frank Karsten in his Metagame Mentor, “new competitive dynamics can emerge.”

As we reported earlier this week, new mono-red staples like Nova Hellkite and Razorkin Needlehead are spiking in price as Magic players jump at the opportunity to fight back against the Vivi Ornitier tide. But others are brewing different alternatives that, while a lot less popular, also showed up at Orlando.

And among the latter there's increased interest in a green creature not from Edge of Eternities or Final Fantasy, but the previous MTG set: Surrak, Elusive Hunter.

Surrak, Elusive Hunter Price Spike

Ouroboroid (Edge of Eternities) – art by Samuel Perin

Surrak, Elusive Hunter hasn't made too much of a dent in Commander, where it's hardly played in casual brews, and never seen in cEDH decks. But this legendary human warrior from Tarkir: Dragonstorm has found its way into two different Standard decks that showed up in Orlando, and has seen its price nearly triple since mid-August: You could get near-mint copies of the regular version for less than fifty cents early last week, but this week jumped over $1.50 on average, with some copies trading as high $5 in US markets:

Source: TCGplayer – Surrak, Elusive Hunter (TDM), near mint

Surrak, Elusive Hunter shows up in two different spots.

On the one hand, it's a sideboard tech in Temur Aggro decks (an archetype which Frank Karsten dubs Temur Battlecrier given that it plays 4x of that Temur card). Incidentally, these decks also contribute to the current spike we're seeing for Nova Hellkite, often playing one copy in the main deck.

But where Surrak, Elusive Hunter really shines is in aggressive Simic brews. There are several takes on this archetype: Some Simic Aggro play 3 copies of Surrak, Elusive Hunter in the main deck as their top end, while others go for a more midrange-y approach that tops their curve with and .

What Will Happen With Surrak, Elusive Hunter's Prices?

Divination – Illustration by Matt Stewart

While not a rival to Final Fantasy as far as sales go, Tarkir: Dragonstorm did surpass WotC's expectations, and is selling very well. Which means there's lots of available supply: The Magic card market is already reacting to Surrak, Elusive Hunter‘s spike and, at the time of writing, there's a flood of listings available on TCGplayer – and shipping costs may have more impact than the price of the card itself in the final number (there are lots of copies listed between 30 and 40 cents, but with extra shipping costs at about $1.31).

Surrak, Elusive Hunter has proven it's very playable in Standard competitive decks, but at the moment it seems unlikely that the price will go much higher than that unless some Simic or Temur player deck breaks the Standard meta… or unless Spider-Man, which will swing into Magic in two weeks, brings along more green toys that Surrak, Elusive Hunter can play with.