Purchasing The Power Nine
This is a story of buying the power nine, written by someone who is not a
speculator, investor, or dealer.
Since I created this website I have avoided including personal stories, trying
instead to focus on the impartial presentation of information, and occasionally
hosting articles by other contributors. However this year I recently reached a
colleting milestone, and have decided to write an article in a departure from this
precedent.
I started playing Magic in 1994 when a friend’s older brother from Seattle came
to town and dropped off a big box of revised and chronicles cards that he was no
longer using. This started a long journey, which is still ongoing today. The local
toy store had packs of Ice Age, Homelands, and Alliances, which we purchased
and made incredibly inefficient 80 card decks with too few lands, no removal, and
lots of large creatures.
When I was 10 years old my mother purchased my brother and I the Magic The
Gathering Official Encyclopedia. In 1996 there was very few online resources,
and few of them included photos, so this encyclopedia introduced me and my
brother to many of these cards for the first time.
I remember being fixated with the “Discontinued Cards” page, which was all the
cards that were printed in Unlimited, but not reprinted in Revised. This included
cards which me and my brother became obsessed with like Chaos Orb, Lich,
Raging River, Cyclopean Tomb, Two Headed Giant, Illusionary Mask, and of
course: the Power Nine.
The Moxen were not interesting for a 10 year old (fancy lands), neither was
Timetwister (an expensive Wheel of Fortune), or Ancestral Recall (card draw was
very ‘meh’), but Time Walk seemed like the most amazing card ever printed. For
a 10 year old, then number of times I had lost a game when “if I just had one
more turn, I would have won”, was innumerable. It also had arguably some of
the best art of any magic card from that era, a blending of sci-fi and fantasy.
At age 10 I purchased a Chaos Orb from Troll and Toad online for $80, and
received and incredibly HP Orb, which was the pinnacle of my collection at the
time. Anything more expensive than that was still firmly in the realm of
unobtainable. Power Nine cards were $150+ and a Lotus was $300+.
When I turned 11 and started Middle School, I put away my magic cards and
forgot about them entirely for the next 25 years until Christmas of 2016 when my
Brother and I discovered our old cards again. It was a slow burn after that which
included us dabbling with both Modern and Legacy, which didn't quite feel right. I
remember telling someone at a game night that I missed the old frames and
hated flip cards and planeswalkers, and he said to me” “I think you are looking for
Oldschool, you should check out Edwin the Magic Engineer on Youtube”. He
was right.
Both my brother and I dove head first into the Oldschool format, and started
building fun budget decks, both agreeing that we would never spend the money
on Power Nine.
By the middle of 2018 I had an epiphany in the shower. I could reasonably afford
a few pieces of the Power Nine, but would only pick up three pieces. Mox Ruby,
Mox Emerald, and a Timewalk. Two of the cheaper Moxes and the Timewalk I
had always wanted.
Mox Emerald
November 2018 I was laying on a rooftop in Manilla. I had just finished
mobilizing the biggest project of my career to date, and from start to finish it went
very well. So well that I had just received the first sizeable bonus of my career,
and decided it was time to pull the trigger on a piece of power. I was laying by
the pool sipping a Pina Colada browsing TCGPlayer when I saw that MTGSeattle
had listed an HP emerald online. I emailed them directly asking for photos and
the pictures they sent across were perfect. It was just my kind of power, heavy
play but not gross. They then dropped the price another $100 and I snapped it
up before someone else did. Total cost including shipping and tax: $1,300.
Time Walk
The second piece I saw pop up on Ebay listed by a store in the city where my
brother lives. They listed an MP time walk at a great price, and I contacted them
by email to see how much of a cash discount I could get if I bought it in
person. We went back and forth a few times but eventually the owner stopped
replying. On Christmas eve I was visiting my brother and got a message from
the seller: “I can do $1,300 cash today”. I had $500 in my wallet, and knew I
could get $300 max from the ATM. I asked my brother to take out another $300,
and then borrowed money from my father for the first time in over a decade to
make up the rest. We drove down to the strip mall where the card shop was, and
peeked around looking for the shop before we finally found it. When the owner
pulled it out I couldn't believe how nice it was, I light tested it and louped it before
laying out the money on the countertop. I remember we turned the lights off in
the entire store so I could light test it. As I was leaving one of the patrons of the
store asked: “you gonna buy the full set?”, and I replied: “no, just picking up three
pieces”.
Mox Ruby
The third piece was much more spontaneous. I woke up one morning and
checked TCGPlayer (my usual routine), and saw a Ruby listed for $900 with no
photos (about $400 under its market value at the time). The seller had really
horrible feedback, but when I looked though it, none of it was for fake cards, it
was all for delayed shipping and horrible communication. I Googled the store
name and found an email address for the store and sent him an email asking for
pictures. It was super HP, but they were good enough pictures to tell it was legit,
and he had the card in hand. I asked my brother what he thought and his reply
was: “you are gonna regret it more if you pass on it than if you buy it and have to
get a TCG refund”. I pulled the trigger and it showed up in 5 days 100%
authentic and well packaged.
Ancestral Recall
Immediately after getting the three pieces I decided I needed one more, an
Ancestral Recall: the best piece of power. It was outside of my budget, but I
knew I needed that raw power for my oldschool deck. I scanned Ebay daily until
I found one that was listed by a shop I knew, so I emailed them to see if they
could take 10% off the asking price. They agreed, and we had a deal. Total cost
including shipping and tax: $1,750
Mox Sapphire
Now that I had the Timewalk and the Ancestral it was obvious I really needed a
Mox Sapphire to make my blue splashes more consistent, and give my UR
Counterburn the option of showing double blue on turn one. I found one for a
good price on Ebay and then made the purchase. The seller cancelled the order
and told me (the card was more HP then he had originally thought, and didn't feel
comfortable selling it, but I assured him I was aware of the condition and didn't
care, after some back and forth he eventually shipped it to me. Total cost
including shipping and tax: $1,750
Mox Jet
I decided I needed one more piece of power (and then I would be done for sure),
a Mox jet. Me and my brother had decided to go to GP Vegas in 2019, and play
in the old school event at the GP, as well as an off site side event. I was playing
UR Counterburn with a black splash and the Jet was a key piece I was missing. I
decided I would pick one up at the GP before the event. It was the first GP for
both me and my brother, and the first real MTG event either of us had ever
attended. I showed up a day early to give myself time to make the Jet deal, and
walked around for 6 hours looking at cards, and getting price quotes on the cards
I was selling. I finally found a very nice MP Jet for $1,600 cash with roller lines
(which I love), and needed to come up with the cash. I sold an LP alpha
illusionary mask to a Chinese buyer for a good price, sold some fetch lands, and
two Italian invoke prejudices to come up with the money, and then purchased my
prize.
Timetwister
I had been putting off buying a Timetwister because I considered it to be the
weakest piece of power, but after GP Vegas I knew my deck was missing the
blue draw seven. On Christmas Eve a Timetwister popped up from a seller I
knew on discord which had a faint crease in the middle but was a very attractive
price, so I purchased what I was sure was my last piece of power. It was my first
time buying a card that expensive from an individual without any buyer
protections, so I was very nervous. In hindsight I was too worried, the seller was
one of the most respected online vendors at the time, but I was very relieved
when it arrived without any issues. Total cost including shipping and tax: $1,800
Mox Pearl
Looking at my power seven, I knew that I would need to at least get a pearl. It
would make my dead guy ale build much stronger and then I would at least have
the complete set of Moxen. I checked discord daily until a seller I knew listed a
great MP copy at a good price, and I bought it. I was just less nervous buying
from an individual this time and it arrived without any issues. Total cost including
shipping and tax: $1,320.
Before he shipped it he asked me if I was looking for anything else, and I said I
was done buying power, and I now had all the pieces except for Lotus. He sent
me a photo of an HP lotus and said he could let it go for $6,250. I declined.
Black Lotus
In 2020 I decided it was time to make a move and pick up a lotus. It was the last
piece of power I needed, it would go in ever Oldschool deck I had, if I ever
wanted to finish a set of unlimited I would need it, and if I ever decided to try out
Vintage I would want it. The price for an HP lotus had dropped down to around
$5,500 on TCGPlayer at the time, so I started looking a stores with HP lotuses
for sale, and what they buylists were, so I could try and cover at least 60% of the
cost with trade in. I had lined up what I was going to sell planning to make the
trade / sale when I visited Portland in December, and then a few weeks before
my trip the price of power exploded, and all the HP lotuses were now listed for
$15,000. At this point I shelved the idea of a Lotus, and resigned myself to the
fact that I would never buy one. The cost of one was now in total more than what
I had spent on the rest of my power combined, and it wasn't even close. I just
couldn't bring myself to buy one.
About a year later towards the end of 2021, the prices of Lotuses had come
down a bit, and all the Alpha cards I had been purchasing since 2017 had come
up in value quite a bit. I found a seller in Arizona with a very nice MP copy for
$12,000 and arranged to meet with him in person to make the deal, Looking at
the Card Kingdom buylist I could sell around $8,000 in Alpha cards and dual
lands, and then around $4,000 in cash would give me the money I needed to pick
up the Lotus. My “cost basis” would be around $7,000 based on what I paid for
the alpha cards and dual lands, and that was a price I could live with. I sold the
cards to CK, and ended up selling a large piece via Facebook, and had the
$8,000 I needed in my PayPal account. A day before the deal the seller started
to get cold feet and said he had gotten better offers for the card elsewhere. He
said he would still honor the deal, but would do so reluctantly. I appreciated him
giving me the option of forcing the deal ahead, but I allowed him to back out as I
had just seen a nice MP Alpha Time Walk listed by an online seller, which has
always been a dream card of mine, and honestly was much more cool than the
Lotus. Unfortunately when I asked for pictures from the store I was able to tell
that the card was a clipped re-back and I had to cancel the order. Fortunately a
seller I know very well from Scandinavia messaged me a few weeks later with an
MP Alpha Time Walk, and few bank transfers later I had my Alpha Time Walk.
About a year later towards the end of 2022, someone from my brothers local play
group reached out and asked him if he was still looking for a Unlimited Lotus. He
said that he was (for me), and got some pictures sent his way. The seller had a
beautiful NM copy, and a very nice LP copy (graded BGS 8). I contacted the
seller and told him both copied were way to nice for me, but if he was interested
in some high end cards I was selling we might be able to make a deal. I
contacted him directly and sent him the card list. He was interested in all the
cards at 80% of their market value, if I could add another $7,000 in cash on top.
I told him it was a deal, but tried not to get my hopes up too much, as I had now
been two years since I had started looking for a Lotus, and already had two deals
fall through.
We arranged to meet in the airport before my flight out of the country, we with 50
or so Alpha Beta and Antiquities cards and $7,000, and him with the BGS Lotus.
We set up at a table in the airport, he looked though the cards, counted the cash
and we shook hands and made the deal. In some ways it was the culmination of
a 4 year long journey, and in other ways it was the end of a journey which started
in 1995 looking at the pages of the Magic the Gathering Encyclopedia. It felt
great, but also strange like there was nothing left to hunt for, and also weird that I
now had a piece of cardboard worth more than any car I had ever owned.
Especially weird considering the strange economic times we are in.
I am holding on to the lotus for now and enjoying looking at how perfect it is, but
sometime in 2023 I might trade it down to a HP or MP players copy to match the
rest of my power. Or maybe this is the start of me upgrading all my power to LP
copies. Only time will tell, but I look forward to whatever is coming next.