Magic: The Gathering players would love a chance to get a hold of or at least see some of these rare cards.

Magic: The Gathering turns 30 in 2022, and over the game's long history, there have been tens of thousands of unique cards printed. While some of these cards have been printed over and over again, there are certain Magic cards that are either very rare or one of a kind.

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Some of these rare Magic cards were printed so long ago that collectors will have trouble tracking down someone willing to sell them. Other cards were printed for a special few or even just one person, and will likely never see wide circulation. For whatever reason, Magic players would love a chance to get a hold of or at least see some of these rare cards.

Being a Magic: The Gathering judge is a somewhat thankless job. These game experts are not paid by Wizards of the Coast and are left to reach arrangements with tournament organizers. As a show of appreciation for these unsung heroes of the game, Wizards distributes special promotional cards to the game's judges.

Gaea's Cradle is an incredibly powerful and sought-after card in its own right. However, it was also one of the first-ever judge promos. While it's hard to get an exact number of how many were printed, Magic's organized play had only existed for about two years when this card was printed. It's safe to assume there weren't as many judges back then and therefore not many of these cards.

Though copies of the newer version of Imperial Seal are easier for players to get their hands on, the original copy is much harder to find. Despite it being an intentionally worse version of the existing Vampiric Tutor, this scarcity has made the card a hot commodity.

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Imperial Seal was first printed in the set Portal Three Kingdoms, which was only available in overseas markets. While there was a larger print run of foreign language versions, the English versions of these cards were mostly sold in Australia and New Zealand. Due to the relatively small distribution of English versions, it is very rare to find an original Imperial Seal in the language.

Before Wizards of the Coast began publishing their own fiction, HarperPrism published 12 Magic: The Gathering novels. Of these books, five contained a special coupon that readers could mail to Wizards of the Coast to receive a free promotional card.

The print run and time window for this promotion were limited, so anyone buying one of these books second-hand today can't mail in an unused form and receive a card. Besides this, with the exception of Mana Crypt, most of the cards printed this way were not very good. While some cards are hard to find because they're powerful and people want to hang on to them, a lot of these cards are rare because they weren't worth mailing in for or holding on to.

These Power 9 are rare cards from Magic's first three sets, Alpha, Beta, and Unlimited, are widely considered by players to be the most powerful cards ever printed. The most famous of these cards is Black Lotus, a card so powerful and hard to find that it is worth over $30,000.

Estimates on the number of Black Lotuses ever printed are around 23,000, with similar numbers for the rest of the Power 9. While this might seem like a lot, it has been 29 years since any of these cards were printed. They also won't be printed again since they are on Magic's Reserved List. Over time, many cards have likely been lost, unknowingly discarded, or damaged beyond repair.

Unlike most Magic cards, Heroes of the Realm cards were never intended for the public. These cards are printed as special tokens of appreciation to Wizards of the Coast employees to honor accomplishments within the company. They have their own unique card backs which separate them visually from typical Magic cards.

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Because these cards are only distributed to a specific team of people at the company, they are incredibly rare and unlikely to find their way into the hands of the average player. Each card is one of a kind since the name of each employee receiving one is printed on the bottom right-hand side of their card.

After Magic had been out for a few years, Wizards of the Coast tried out a short-lived program in which experienced players would teach newer players how to play. This "Guru" program allowed participants to earn points that could be exchanged for special promotional cards.

These promo cards came in the form of the five basic lands in Magic, each with its own special artwork. The program barely lasted two years, from mid-1999 to 2001, so not too many of these promotional cards found their way into circulation.

After the initial print run of Magic's Revised Edition, there were several errors fans noticed about the original run. Some cards had the wrong artwork, others failed to credit the appropriate artist, and the colors on the cards were washed out. In an effort to fix this, Wizards decided to reprint a new version of the set which they called "Edgar."

This set, which came to be known as "Summer Magic" to players due to being released in the Summer of 1994, was ironically released with its own slew of errors. The rarest and most famous of these mistakes is the Hurricane card, which was printed with a blue border instead of the intended green. Due to the errors present in Summer Magic, the set was never officially released and was subsequently destroyed. However, a few boxes had already been shipped and sold, making the lucky few to receive them some of the only players with access to this rare misprint.

Richard Garfield is the creator of Magic: The Gathering and over the years he has been known to use specially created cards to celebrate his life events. One of these is the card Proposal, which Garfield had only a few copies of printed for a very special purpose.

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This card, which had art featuring a big question mark, was slipped into Garfield's deck as a way to propose to his girlfriend at the time, Lily Wu. In total, only eight Proposal cards were ever printed, and they were distributed among Garfield's and Wu's friends and family. The only copy not still possessed by an original owner was one stolen from the card's artist, Quinton Hoover.

As Magic began to gain international popularity, a DCI Tournament Center was planned to be built in Japan. The center wanted a one-of-a-kind Magic card that they could put on display for players to see. This card was Shichifukujin Dragon.

Shichifukujin Dragon was designed by Mark Rosewater, who is currently Magic's head game designer. This card was named after Japan's Seven Gods of Fortune as a good luck charm for the tournament center's opening. The card was on display until the center closed in 2003 when it was moved to the head office of Hobby Japan in Tokyo.

In addition to the prize money, Wizards of the Coast wanted to give the first-ever Magic world champion something special to remember their victory. To do this, the company printed a one-of-a-kind card simply named 1996 World Champion.

What makes this the rarest Magic card is the fact that Wizards of the Coast destroyed not only the original print sheet, but also the printing plates for the card in a ceremony after the tournament, ensuring that only one of these cards exists. The champion, Tom Chanpheng, sold the card to a collector in 2001 and that is where it has been for 21 years.

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Sean (he/him) is a writer and enjoyer of all things nerdy. Apart from comics, he enjoys table top games and occasionally making video content.

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