Wizards of the Coast made the new Monster Hunter Secret Lair drop coming this December official last week, but as far as Secret Lair reveals go, this one was messy, to say the least. While we knew that Monster Hunter would be a Secret Lair drop comprised of reprints, we only knew the names of the cards. On top of that, it was extremely unclear which cards appeared in what drop.
The good news is that all the community’s speculations last weekend were true. The Hunt and The Hunters have the reprints that many MTG players expected, making The Hunters the best Secret Lair of the bunch. Alongside confirmation for how the two Monster bundles are split up, we also have a new promo and a premium Secret Lair bundle that will be up for grabs alongside the Monster Hunter Secret Lair.
Monster Hunter x Sol Ring
As many players may have expected, we have yet another Universes Beyond Sol Ring promo on the way. Awarded to those who spend $99 or more on the Monster Hunter Secret Lair sale this December, a Valstrax Sol Ring continues a long and somewhat disappointing legacy of Secret Lair sale promos. These cards are generally nice treats that have some collectible value, but aren’t worth going out of your way for. All of that said, this Sol Ring is a better deal than these promos traditionally are.
The reprint value of Sol Ring is not impressive, only worth a little over $1, but because of how ubiquitous Sol Ring is in Commander, the rarer variants are generally worth a little extra. This is especially true for Universes Beyond promos, which could have some collectible value to the right buyer. The Sol Ring available as a bonus card in the PlayStation Secret Lair Superdrop, for example, is currently worth about $7. This Sol Ring has a pretty good chance of going for the same amount, but it’s impossible to truly tell the future.
Notably, the final reveal for the Monster Hunter Secret Lair also included that there will be both English and Japanese languages for these Secret Lair drops, something we also saw with Hatsune Miku and Final Fantasy Secret Lairs. A Japanese Sol Ring accompanies the Secret Lair drops with the same language, which offers the opportunity for both Sol Rings for those who buy $99 worth of Secret Lairs in each language.
Monsters and Monsters II Secret Lairs Confirmed
While the MTG community got the breakdown for The Hunt and The Hunters correct, the two Monsters bundles were impossible to predict. Now, we know for certain how these bundles are organized. Sadly, as we suggested in our past article, neither of these Secret Lairs are very enticing from a financial perspective.
In Monsters, pictured above, the most enticing reprint is definitely Nezahal, Primal Tide. Offering a massive stream of card draw on an uncounterable body with built-in protection, this is an extremely difficult card to deal with properly. An auto-include in Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy cEDH lists, Nezahal’s secondary market value is an enticing $7.30, making this a welcome reprint.
Sadly, all of the other cards in this Secret Lair offer a reprint value of under a dollar. Sure, they’re flavorful, and they allow Monster Hunter fans to play some of their favorite characters in the Command Zone, but that doesn’t make their reprint value much better. There will likely be some demand from players who already run these cards as their Commanders, but the reprint value of this Secret Lair is a disappointing $11.
The silver lining is that this Secret Lair does get a lot better for its foil variant, as many of these reprints are from older sets that existed before Collector Boosters dropped foil premiums. Nezahal alone has a foil value of around $22 for near mint foils, but Vaevictus Asmundi, the Dire adds another $10 to the total. Other foils still remain under a dollar, but this does make the foil variant of Monsters a much better deal than the nonfoil one. Despite this, the Secret Lair fails to break even in both variants.
MTG X Monster Hunter Secret Lair: Monsters II
The second Monsters Secret Lair offers four cards as players initially expected. Similar to the Monsters Secret Lair, there is one reprint here that blows the others out of the water. Razaketh, the Foulblooded commonly sees play as a win condition that can essentially tutor up any combination of cards to win the game. Seeing play across all kinds of different cEDH decks, Razaketh has a secondary market value of about $8.
The story with Monsters 2 is otherwise extremely similar to Monsters. None of the other cards in this Secret Lair are worth more than a dollar, marking the nonfoil Secret Lair reprint value at about $10. The foil variant of this Secret Lair isn’t redeemable, either, with the only foil premiums coming from Razaketh himself for a reprint value of $13.
If you want to see the reprint contents of the other two Secret Lair Bundles, including a financial breakdown for them, you can find that here.
$236 Amped State Surge Foil Bundle
The last piece of information that wasn’t part of the initial Secret Lair drop is a new bundle offering exclusive Surge Foil variants of each of the four Monster Hunter Secret Lairs. Available in both English and Japanese, you can only find the Surge Foil variants of the four Monster Hunter Secret Lairs in this bundle. In other words, you cannot get these Secret Lairs separately.
The $236 price tag on this Secret Lair bundle is extremely expensive compared to your other options. For reference, the Hunter’s Carve Bundle, which includes a copy of each nonfoil and foil Secret Lair in the language of your choice, is $279. For just $43 more, you’re getting twice as many cards as you are in the Surge Foil bundle. With exclusivity, however, also comes premiums. The Surge Foil Secret Lairs for Monster Hunter could end up being worth the investment, but it’s impossible to know for sure.
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