Some of Magic’s most memorable promotional cards are not even playable. As much as MTG fans love some quality reprints, especially if they once held hefty price tags, sometimes it’s cool to see unique, collectible cards showcased for special occasions. After all, we’ve had an insane number of promo cards released over the past couple years. From 30th anniversary promos available at prerelease events to Store Championship promos associated with every premier set, players have ample opportunities to get their hands on some cards with intriguing artwork.
While many of these promotional cards provide players with the chance to add some pizazz to their favorite decks, some promos are designed simply to be cool additions to a collection. For example, the release of the annual Holiday promo fits this mold. Today, the 2023 Holiday promo was revealed, and as usual, it is rather punny and fun. Before we dive into the specifics of this year’s promo, it’s worthwhile to take a look back at this timeless tradition.
A Brief History
Starting back in 2006, Wizards of the Coast has released one specific Holiday promo annually. These cards are typically quite flavorful, generally with Christmas-related themes. Many of these cards, like last year’s Holiday promo Chaos Wrap, also make direct references to previously made cards. Chaos Wrap is a wacky take on Chaos Warp, with a somewhat similar effect. The goal with many of these cards is to somewhat resemble a traditional MTG card that someone could play with like normal, while adding some wacky, on-theme antics to the design. In this sense, these cards are pretty similar to cards from various Un sets.
Much like cards from Un sets in the past, like Unglued, these Holiday promo cards are not tournament legal. These cards have the acorn stamp, which just like the silver border featured on cards in the past, designates that they are unintended to be used in tournament play. However, these cards are still reasonable to utilize in a casual atmosphere. Therefore, if you are playing Commander with a group of friends in an unsanctioned environment, feel free to check with the group about playing with these interesting cards.
Each Holiday promo is foil-only and are given out by Wizards of the Coast at the yearly Holiday Party. This means that they are not typically distributed in large numbers. Stores, employees, partners, and friends of Wizards of the Coast are generally the groups able to get first dibs on these cards. That doesn’t mean they don’t become available within the secondary market, though. Previous Holiday promos are available for purchase on TCGplayer, for example, making them neat gift ideas for celebration.
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Seasonal Sequels
Seasonal Sequels is the 2023 Holiday promo, and once again, it is indeed very flavorful. The card costs XUUU, and essentially lets you copy a spell on the stack X times. However, in a festive manner, simply paying mana for X is not good enough. You also need to come up with that many holiday-themed sequel pitches to say out loud to gain the card copies. Depending on the card you want to make copies of, this may be easier said than done. Notably, both the card’s artwork and flavor text give some helpful hints.
In the artwork, the titles Die Hardened Scales and Llanowar Elf appear. These clearly showcase the blending of “Die Hard” and Hardened Scales as well as “Elf” and Llanowar Elves. The flavor text then mentions additional examples for inspiration, including Sword of Hearth and Home Alone. Getting to potentially make a bunch of copies of a big spell could actually be super impactful on the game, but the key is being able to come up with a bunch of sequel pitch ideas on the spot.
Perhaps some of the most amusing and powerful spells to copy are those with Miracle. As WR810 suggests, Miracle on the 34th Draw is a funny take on “Miracle on 34th Street” that emphasizes the Miracle mechanic. Funnily enough, though, there are a decent number of Christmas movies with “Miracle” somewhere in the title.
As a result, if you come prepared with reworked titles for “Once Upon a Christmas Miracle,” “A Godwink Christmas: Miracle of Love,” and so on, you can get a bunch of copies of a spell with Miracle from your deck. Since Seasonal Sequels is blue, getting to copy Temporal Mastery a plethora of times (“Twice Upon a Christmas Miracle” could be a solid example, since you are taking an extra turn) is actually very strong.
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What’s the Card Worth?
As mentioned, though, the overall limited supply of these foil cards means that, even as collectibles primarily, these Holiday promos can be worth a decent amount of money. For example, Chaos Wrap is still going for roughly $28 according to TCGplayer market price. Last-Minute Chopping, the Holiday promo from 2021, currently sits at $32. This is after both cards have been noticeably trending downwards in price over the last three months, according to TCGplayer market price history.
Therefore, Seasonal Sequels is likely to be rather pricey, especially when it first comes out. Still, it’s a fun gift idea, nonetheless. It’s nice to see Wizards of the Coast continue this trend, and this card in particular is a neat and amusing design.
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