Jace doubled. Most of Reality Fracture got cut in half.

Oct 16, 2026

Hey friends,

Reality Fracture has been out for two weeks, and the prices have split in two. If you’re holding cards, trading, or deciding what to pick up for Standard, this one’s for you.

The lead: Standard cards held, Commander cards dropped

BaseMTG compared the set’s ten priciest cards from preorder week with prices on October 13. The headline: “Nine of the ten priciest Reality Fracture cards from preorder week are cheaper now, by a median of 51.9%.”

The exception is The Theorist, Jace Beleren. It went from $32.97 to $69.12, more than double. It’s also the set’s most-played mythic in Standard: BaseMTG counted it in 56 of the 449 Standard Challenge top-32 lists from October 1 to 12.

Some of the drops were big:

• Omnipresence: $20.95 to $3.55 (-83%)
• Samut, Tyrant of Naktamun: $32.40 to $7.78 (-76%)
• Emrakul, the Exigent Doom: $38.06 to $19.78 (-48%)

What the losers have in common is that almost nobody plays them in Standard. Their price rests on Commander demand, and the set is still being opened, so new copies keep showing up. BaseMTG’s advice: “For Standard players, buy now.” For Commander-only cards, wait.

One note on the fancy foils: the Facet Foil Omnipresence was listed at $506.95 while the regular copy was $3.55. BaseMTG calls these “thin markets,” where one listing can be a single hopeful seller. Don’t treat those numbers as stable.

Meanwhile, old cards are spiking

The new commanders are pushing up older cards:

• Agatha of the Vile Cauldron was “only $1.10 back in the summer,” per Wargamer, and now sits at $13.19 on MTGGoldfish. The cause is a combo with the new sphinx commander Aerid Konstrari, and she shows up in “2,700 out of 4,500 Konstrari decks logged on EDHREC.”
• Aminatou, the Fateshifter “exploded from about $3-$4 last Friday, to well over $20,” according to Draftsim’s spike report for Oct 3–9. The cause is a combo with Oath of Teferi and Spark Double.
• The Chain Veil jumped “from around $6 to well into the $15 range,” driven by planeswalker decks like Tam, the Possibility.

Draftsim calls it “Planeswalker Season and Sphinx Season,” and that’s fair. If you have old planeswalker support or sphinxes in a binder, check them before you trade them away.

Why Jace went the other way: Standard

The new Standard is healthy and wide open. Frank Karsten’s first look at Reality Fracture results (magic.gg, Oct 8) put Izzet Spellementals on top at 9.0% of the winner’s metagame. Dimir Midrange followed at 8.7%, Jund Sacrifice at 8.5% and Orzhov Life Gain at 8.3%. In his words, “no deck currently claiming more than ten percent of the winner’s metagame.”

More recent Magic Online numbers from MyDecklist, covering 1,033 decklists through Oct 15, show the top tightening a bit: Izzet Spellementals at 11.4% and Jund Sacrifice at 10.5%. That’s a different method from Karsten’s, but the takeaway is the same: there’s no single best deck.

Jace fits right in. He’s the main win condition in Azorius Control lists and shows up across Jeskai and Dimir. Karsten’s favorite new deck might be Rakdos Lizards, where Master of Barbs and Ingris Stingerquill can set up “a potential turn-three kill!”

Standard is the format for RCQs right now, and Magic Spotlight: Fracture runs at the end of October in Hartford and Beijing. So the cards people play in Standard are where the money is holding.

Star Trek previews start Tuesday

Magic: The Gathering Star Trek debuts October 20 on Magic’s YouTube channel and twitch.tv/magic, followed by the WeeklyMTG aftershow. Wizards will update the card gallery every weekday morning, and the full gallery goes up October 30. Commander previews run Oct 26–29 across four themed days: “We Are the Borg,” “Federation Fleet,” “Klingon Fury” and “Landing Party.” The set releases November 13.

Arena news, plus what the October bans actually did

On MTG Arena:

• Alchemy: Reality Fracture went live October 13 with 31 digital cards, including a Jace spellbook. Wizards also said in the October ban announcement that this is “the final Alchemy supplemental drop,” with the Alchemy format sunsetting at rotation early next year.
• Contender Draft runs through early November. Entry is 3,000 gems or 20,000 gold, and a 7-win run pays 7,200 gems plus 12 packs and 10 mythic packs.
• Five Champion Decks are in the store Oct 16–Nov 9.
• The October Qualifier Weekend (Standard) is Oct 31–Nov 1.

The October 12 bans: Here’s the plain version, because some coverage oversold it. No paper format changed. Standard, Pioneer, Modern, Legacy, Vintage and Pauper all got “No changes,” and so did regular Brawl.

Only Arena’s Competitive Brawl changed:

• Three commanders are now banned as commanders: Yuriko, the Tiger’s Shadow; Spider-Man 2099; and Light-Paws, Emperor’s Voice.
• Nine cards that were fully banned (including Oko, Ragavan, Nadu and Wrenn and Six) are now “only banned as a commander,” so you can play them in the 99 again.
• Nashi, Illusion Gadgeteer loses flash.

If you own the newly banned commanders, Arena gives up to one wildcard per card. The next announcement is November 30.

Gaming roundup

• GTA VI got its launch trailer. It comes out Thursday, November 19 on PS5 and Xbox Series, just in time for The Game Awards cutoff.
• Sega pulled the Total War: Shogun 2 remaster days after launch, following complaints about bugs and artwork some players blamed on AI upscaling. If you bought it, you can keep playing.
• Jagex canceled RuneScape Reignited after player backlash, less than two weeks after announcing it.
• Steam is testing achievement “sets,” so DLC and seasonal achievements stop wrecking your completion percentage.
• Caves of Qud fans: the Diaspora DLC hits Early Access December 9 for $14.99.

That’s it for this week. Go check your binder for old sphinxes.

See you next week, Tim

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