Magic: The Gathering’s newest set, The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth, is a card collector’s dream, and no, it’s not purely because of the 1 of 1 Ring. The epic fantasy crossover between the widely-loved The Lord of the Rings franchise and billion dollar TCG mainstay features Tolkien’s world and characters turned into formidable (and gorgeously illustrated) creatures, spells, and lands.
While the Universes Beyond set is a card-gremlin’s paradise not only because of the 1 of 1 Ring – a serialised 001 of 001 card, only available in a single English-language Collector Booster from the set globally – it would be difficult to explain the hype around The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth without delving deeper into it.
Magic: The Gathering players and complete newbies to the TCG alike are in an absolute frenzy trying to score the card, which currently has million dollar bounties on it from various collectors and auction houses. Even xQc, who seemingly isn’t a Magic megafan, is joining in on the action; in a video posted only yesterday to his YouTube channel, the streamer purchased five Collector Booster boxes (selling for around $670 AUD per box) to try and score the 1 of 1 Ring. In another stream, he opened yet another 13 Collector Booster Boxes, meaning the streamer has spent at least $12,060 AUD trying to cash in on one of the most hyped Magic cards to date.
To put it into perspective, the oft-mentioned Black Lotus card, which has been widely considered the most expensive Magic: The Gathering card ever, sold for a record-breaking $615,000 USD at auction in 2022 (the specific version sold was a signed artist proof Black Lotus from Magic’s Limited Edition Beta set, the game’s second release ever). That’s a hell of a lot of cash.
While I’ve decided I’d simply reappear after an extended absence with a suspiciously large amount of new, expensive belongings if I were to pull it, I do admit the drama of yeeting the 1 of 1 Ring off of the top of the IRL version of Mount Doom is tempting. But, given the odds are stacked against collectors hoping they’ll be the lucky one that pulls the Precious, I’ll probably just be sticking to my day job for now.
However, beyond the serialised card, there’s plenty more for collectors to get hyped about in this new Magic: The Gathering set. There’s 281 regular cards available to pull in The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth, with 451 if you include all of the variants.
There’s a number of other serialised cards with much better odds, with foil and non-foil versions of the commander staple, Sol Ring, in Human (regular English), Dwarven, and Elven script. The double rainbow foil Sol Ring in Elven (1 of 300) is priced anywhere between $2,000-$5,000 USD in near-mint condition, with the more common (but still mega rare) 1 of 9,000 non-foil Sol Ring in English fetching around $250 USD.
If serialised cards aren’t quite your vibe, or you have awful luck getting good pulls (like me), there’s other cards like the Orcish Bowmasters currently selling for around $50 AUD in the borderless alternate art foil. This card’s price also seems to be directly tied to how powerful it can be in a deck, with a low mana cost and powerful abilities that hamper the efforts of opponents with card draw as part of their deck’s playstyle.
The uncommon Nazgûl card in all its various alternate printings is also proving to be a hit with collectors, with the most expensive version (with art by Antonio J. Manzanedo) spiking by almost 550% in price prior to release, when many other cards began to see a significant price drop. The pricing seems to be based on the art itself for this one, as every Nazgûl card is identical in how it plays, with the only key difference being the art on each variant.
It looks like many collectors, LOTR fans, players, and neutral parties that just like making a buck off of shiny things are clamouring to get their little mitts on The Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth Magic: The Gathering card singles and sealed products – whichever box you fall into, there seems to be something of interest for you. Whether Magic: The Gathering can follow up such a standout set that seems to just get it right on so many levels (art, lore, mechanics, collectability, and hype) is anyone’s guess, but it seems we’ll be hearing plenty more about this set for some time yet. For the LOTR franchise fans among you, there’s plenty to see when it comes to smart little nods to the lore (see: Shadowfax, literally showing us the meaning of haste on the card), although unfortunately no card referencing that one time Viggo Mortensen broke his toe kicking the helmet in The Two Towers.
Now, if you need me, I’ll be admiring my new cards that add to my ever-growing hoard – after all, why not? Why shouldn’t I keep them?
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