MTG Weekly Price Spikes: 8/7 – 8/14

Last updated on August 14, 2026

Knucklebone Witch | Illustration by Jim Pavelec

Magic's The Hobbit crossover (HOB) officially launches today, and just like last week, it's making pretty big waves in the MTG card market.

Four of this week's five movers have pretty obvious Middle-earth fingerprints: Goblins, Elves, Dwarves, and one particularly masochistic dragon have given older cards new (and much higher!) prices.

Let's check what's up!

Knucklebone Witch

Knucklebone Witch has become one of the hottest Goblin cards on the market almost overnight.

The card's market price currently sits around $9.50, with recent near-mint copies trading close to $10, when it was just around two bucks last Friday. What's more, near-mint copies are currently listed at over $20 in TCGPlayer right now, with very few in stock:

Source: MTGStocks

The culprit here is pretty clear: The Great Goblin.

This new The Hobbit commander cares about two things that goblin decks tend to do anyway. Whenever another goblin, orc, or army you control dies, The Great Goblin exiles the top card of your library and lets you play it until the end of your next turn. And whenever you put one or more counters on a goblin, orc, or army, it deals 2 damage to an opponent

Knucklebone Witch synergizes twice here. Whenever one of your goblins dies, Knucklebone Witch gets a +1/+1 counter. So one dead goblin can trigger The Great Goblin‘s card-advantage ability, grow the Witch, and then have that new counter trigger The Great Goblin again to burn an opponent for 2.

MTG players have clearly noted the synergy. Around 61% of The Great Goblin decks on EDHREC currently include Knucklebone Witch. Content creators have also been highlighting the commander as one of the strongest new options Goblin players have received in a long time.

On top of that, Knucklebone Witch has never been reprinted since the Lorwyn original; scarce supply and sudden popularity is a pretty explosive combo when it comes to Magic card prices.

Prime Speaker Vannifar

Prime Speaker Vannifar is another MTG card with a single printing, this time from Ravnica Allegiance, that has gone up like crazy since last Friday: near-mint copies were trading for a bit over $2 back then, and now for almost $14.

Source: MTGStocks

The new demand looks primarily tied to Thranduil, the Elvenking.

Thranduil, the Elvenking has all activated abilities of every elf card in your graveyard, and  Vannifar can help with that in two ways: Prime Speaker Vannifar is itself an elf, and it loves sending other creatures to the graveyard if that's what Thranduil prefers.

But there's demand for Vannifar from the other MTG set that's been making waves as of late. While Uugguu, the Omniplasm from Mystery Booster Commander Edition.

While not as popular as Thranduil, Uugguu, the Omniplasm may be an even better home for Vannifar: more than two thirds of the new Uugguu decks include Prime Speaker Vannifar in the 99.

Magda, Brazen Outlaw

Magda, Brazen Outlaw needs little introduction for Commander players. She's already one of Magic's 100 most popular commanders, and she's by a wide margin the most popular dwarf commander in the format.

So, on the surface, it's of little surprise that The Hobbit is making her even more popular, given that she's got a whole new crew of dwarves to play with. 

Her price spike is quite spectacular, though, with some prints more than tripling in price since last week…

Source: MTGStocks

… and that's because there's more to Magda's story.

Turns out she's not just a great Dwarf commander, but also very good in the 99, and she's becoming an almost auto-include in the new Thorin, King of Durin's Folk decks (with this version of Thorin being among the top five most popular commanders from The Hobbit)…

… but here's the kicker: Magda isn't particularly loyal to Thorin.

On the contrary, it looks like Magda is quite the mercenary, and she's happy to hop teams and can frequently be found in Smaug decks, Magda likes treasures every bit as much as the old dragon!

Blazing Sunsteel

In line with Knucklebone Witch and Prime Speaker Vannifar, here's another card with a single printing (in this case from Commander Legends) that's going up thanks to The Hobbit: Blazing Sunsteel.

Source: MTGStocks

The reason? 

Smaug the Smaugsochist the Impenetrable, a Big Bad Dragon who, for starters, is indestructible (so damage kinda glances off him)… but he really likes being punished, and giving you treasures for it.

In this case: Equip the Sunsteel to Smaug and deal him some noncombat damage. Smaug creates Treasures, and Blazing Sunsteel triggers. Then point the Sunsteel's damage back at Smaug… infinite riches!

Bloatfly Swarm

And now for the weird one: Bloatfly Swarm. It saw a huge demand spike yesterday, nearly tripling in price when compared with last week…

… but I haven't found out a compelling reason why.

Bloatfly Swarm certainly isn't a bad or forgotten Commander card, and sees a lot of play with The Wise Mothman, itself currently one of the 20 most popular commanders in all of Magic. But there doesn't seem to be any strong enough connection with The Hobbit, Mystery Booster Commander Edition, or a sudden spike of demand for this card in a 60-card format.

If you have a hunch why, do let me know in the comments!