Summary
Magic: The Gatheringhas held several crossovers with multiple franchises thanks to Universes Beyond, but none seem to capture the flavor of the setting as easily as Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth. That’s likely due to Tolkien’s high-fantasy world being so similar that one could imagine Middle-earth as just another of Magic’s many planes.
But with so many fans of both Magic and Lord of the Rings, the value of these particular cards seems to have some staying power. That and there’s one particular card that’s so unique that it’s value is almost guaranteed to increase over time. Let’s look at ten of these cards and see how expensive they remain.
These prices are based on pre-release information and are subject to change after the set’s official release date. Price info is gathered fromTCGplayer.com.
Updated July 15, 2025, by Sean Murray:It’s been a while since the release of Tales of Middle-earth, and in that time we’ve seen the value of many of these Lord of the Rings cards change wildly thanks to the constant fluctuations of Magic’s secondary market. We’ve refreshed this list with updated card values and replaced several entries that have fallen out of the top 10.
Price
$15.54 (Surge Foil)
A combat trick thatsaves your commanderas well askeeps them safefrom removal and combat pretty much indefinitely. If your opponent doesn’t have an enchantment or some other non-destructive effect to neutralize your newly-armored critter, then Mithril Coat makes your commander invincible.
That sort of power is tough to argue with, which is why Mithril Coat has becomealmost a must-have card for commander decks. Unless you’re working with a budget since even the regular, non-foil version of this card goes for well over $10. The showcase scrolls version is over $15.
$16.08 (Surge Foil)
For the low price of a single legendary artifact and this legendary land, you canblow up the board save for two creatures. Those two creatures don’t have to both belong to you and your opponent—they can just be yours. So it’sa one-sided board wipe that leaves you in the perfect position to winthe game.
The only problem with Mount Doom is it costs life to make mana, so you don’t really want to draw it early. That hasn’t stopped its popularity in Commander fromdriving the price of the surge foil up to $16.
$16.58 (Showcase Scrolls)
A newcomer to the list, Last March of the Ents has become apopular choice for green Commander decks that like to go big. All you need is a creature with a lot of toughness to suddenly have a full hand and potentially an army of monsters.
Perhaps because this card has become popular in Magic’s more casual format explains why the value of this card tends to remain flat among its various versions. Even the standard,non-foil version is priced at nearly $15.
$18.68 (Showcase Scrolls)
Much of thelong-term valueof Magic cardscomes from being played in Magic’s long-term formats. Usually, that means Commander, but sometimes it can mean being played in Magic’s eternal formats: Legacy and Vintage.
Palantir of Orthanc hasfound its way into several Legacy decks as a sideboard cardthat isn’t easily answered by the current meta. Even though there’s rarely more than a single Palatir in any given sideboard, Legacy is such an expensive format that Legacy players are willing to pay a lot for a fancy Palantir. The fanciest Palantir is theshowcase scrolls version, whichgoes for just over $18, but even the regular versions are typically over $10.00.
$23.81 (Showcase Scrolls)
The interesting thing about Nazgul is thatyou can have nine of them, which in a commander deck, actually provides you with better odds than running the usual four cards in a standard 60-card Magic deck. That makes youmore likely to be tempted by The Ring, which makes for a very effective Commander buff.
There are nine different Nazguls out there, and each one also has a Showcase Scroll version which is typically priced at around $10. For some reason,this particular Showcase Scroll Nazgul is priced at $23.81. Your guess is as good as anyone’s as to why that is.
$23.88 (Extended Art)
Commander can be blamed for yet another new entry to Tales of Middle-earth’s top ten priciest cards. Sauron is the classic villain who loves to turn the tables on his opponents. He can show up,steal a big creature, and use it to win the game, or he can just be the last part of a mana combo thatcauses everyone else to lose infinite life. If either of those fails, he can simply come tolead an army of orcs to victory.
However you utilize this big baddie, you’ll have to pay out$24 for the extended art version, but you may get the regular version for around two bucks.
$25.65 (Extended Art)
Life gain? Tokens? Two very attractive people in the throes of matrimony? What’s not to love about Aragorn and Arwen, Wed? This deck fits into a lot of strategies, but the most frequent option is white-green token decks. Although typically not the commander,Aragorn and Arwen make a great addition to any creature-based deckof the appropriate colors.
They’ve also got a greatextended art versionthat’ll cost youclose to $16.
$26.26 (Showcase Surge Foil)
In most Magic games, opponents tend to cast spells. Whenever they do, Sauron gets Orcs. In just a turn or two, you can have an entire army of Orcs do your bidding. And then when that Army deals combat damage, the Ring tempts you, and when that happens, you can discard your hand to draw four cards.
On his own, Sauron will deliver games to players. All he needs is a legendary artifact or creature to sacrifice in defense. And because of this, he’s popular in Commander. You can grab regular versions of this villain for four dollars, but the showcase surge foil version is upwards of $26.
$49.65 (Showcase Scrolls)
Even before Tales of Middle-earth’s release, people suspected Orcish Bowmasters would be thebomb of the set, and they were mostly right. The Bowmasters immediately found their way intoModern,Legacy, and even someVintage deck archetypes, and sparked an ongoing debate about whether they should be banned in Commander.
Good in almost any deck with even a hint of black mana, Orcish Bowmasters has almost doubled its pre-release price with theShowcase Scroll version asking for nearly $50.
$2.6 Million (Serialized)
Like Orcish Bowmasters, The One Ring has found its way intoModern,Legacy, andVintagedecks, but that’s not why this card is so expensive. Wizards of the Coast decided to print alimited run of serialized One Rings,andone of them was entirely unique. This “One Ring to rule them all” was eventually found by a very lucky individual whosold it to Post Malone for $2.6 million. This easily makes it the most expensive Magic card ever printed.
Of course, you’d have to find a regular version without the Elven script to know what it even does. Those cards range in price, buteven totally unserialized versions are around $50.
