A little background on me, for it's worth: I used to play Pokemon: TCG competitively. I was number 7 in the world at one point in the old DCI rankings when Wizards had the publishing rights. I tried playing Magic back then, but all the 'cool' 16-20 year olds wouldn't teach me, and so when Pokemon became boring as I reached my tweens, I ended up leaving TCG's.
I've been playing Magic since RTR block, and it was easier to get back into it. I had some competitive highs (IQ top 8's, PPTQ wins, etc), and Game Day wins, and just the usual, 'getting there' feelings. Not only were people friendlier this time around, but I also have a steady income (as opposed to when I was 12), although it took several sets before I decided to buy-into a top tier deck.
With the introduction of a rarity-value heavy set (BFZ) and the cutting down of local, mid-tier tournaments (anything from IQ's, to PTQ's/PPTQ's, and even the Open Series and their side events), it's hard to really want to play competitively (I understand I'm bundling in SCG with Wizards, but let's be honest- SCG's decisions are all guided by whatever WOTC wants of them).
I feel that Khans was such a great block because almost any deck was playable, and the cost efficiency was on your side. It was also an easy way to get into modern. Magic, however, is now at its most expensive point in recent history.
If you're prized out, however, not only does the competitive-yearnings go out, but the overall interest in the game. When I was climbing my way up the DCI chart for Pokemon, I was buying all of my cards through winnings (boosters). For Magic, that's less feasible, and has become even less feasible now.
I believe that the key to keeping the consumer base happy will always be prize-outs. Other competitive games ask very little when it comes to 'buying-in' and their prize-outs and celebrity status tend to be greater. WOTC, on the other hand, has made an already niche game very elitist to a privileged few at a crucial time when a free to play game (Hearthstone) is becoming all the rage.
What's the long-term hope here? It seems like WOTC is admitting defeat through their stabilization mentality: let's get the most money we can now before Hearthstone bankrupts us. I know that's hyperbolic, but isn't it just a matter of time that competitive players will choose to go with a more profitable route? (I understand that there's the casual fanbase, but does the casual fanbase care about owning the rarer cards either? Not often- you don't see them shelling out $500 for a playset of Goyfs)
I'd argue that the keys to continued growth are powered-up sets and accessibility to the game (including more mid-tier tournaments, the kind of tournaments available to individuals wanting to travel for Grand Prixs but not quite there yet).
While I think most all of the criticism here is valid, one thing I put no stock in is Hearthstone being any kind of threat to Magic. Yeah its free but it's also BORING as **** after about 2 weeks. I'd even venture to say most of the fun is from unlocking stuff in game rather than the actual play. It's almost no different than the WoW tcg and that didn't last all that long. Furthermore it has a smaller card pool and the same "power is concentrated in a small number of cards" problems. In general there is less diversity cards, mechanics and formats, its fun for a while, but when it gets old it gets old fast. Everyone I know that played it went from playing all the time to, "meh I'm done playing that altogether" in a matter of days.
Interesting topic. Personally I can't say if T2 is boring or not, because I stopped playing during RTR block. Switched to collecting only and I am much happier. Nothing is forcing me to get new cards...if I can afford it and I want it, I will get new cards...if not, then nothing. I also decided to set boundaries...I only collect cards from 8th-Theros, and if I decide to go further, I will add older expansions, but not the new ones...they just don't feel like real magic cards to me...
But more on topic: One of the things that ruined it for me is all the extra sets/products they are producing...I remember the times, where only regular sets were printed + basic set every 2 years + few promos....then came the duel deck, From the vaults, commanders, MM, planechase and so on....too much IMO...+ the prerelease promos are LOL....one promo (ususally bomb card) was good...then you could choose from like 5 and play them...not good... and now I heard it is every rare in the set available as a promo version? No thanks....
I'm not sure why that was an issue for you. All that extra stuff is entirely, well...extra. A Standard or Modern player, who plays no other formats, need not ever pay attention to these extra sets. If you do play other formats then, well, they are printing extra stuff for you that normally would never make it into a set designed and developed for Standard, so that seems like a good thing. Assuming you are not compelled to buy all things MTG, I can't really see the downside.
And why do they print already existing cards under new names? Does it boost sales so much when instead of llanowar elves they print Elvish Mystic?
MaRo has written about this before, and I can't recall all the reasons, but the reason for this example is that "Llanowar" is tied to Dominaria. When the Core Sets stopped being 100% reprints they started to be tied to the actual block stories more an more, and since the story line has not returned to Dominaria in some time it doesn't make much since to have the Llanowar name associated with a card. Mystic Elves, however, is much more generic and when you are talking about a card that will likely be reprinted quite a bit you need it to fit on every plane. As far as I know this new name treatment has only been given to commons. I know that they have made exceptions in recent years to the pain lands, and I think this is because they needed them in Standard and it would have bothered players too much to reprint a rare land with a lot of history under a new name. Plus they didn't have to commission new art.
What the kool aid drinkers and other WOTC apologists don't seem to realize, is that the inflation has now even reached sub tier 2 decks in constructed formats.
When we'll reach a point that even "casual decks" will be 300+ usd, I wonder how many new players will be willing to try MTG.
Also, plenty of people seem to take the Standard's appeal and success for granted, but if they keep designing sets where the format staples are almost exclusively Mythics and rares the standard inflation isn't gonna get better any time soon, and that problem has gotten worse with the new rotation rules.
I'm quiet sure we're gonna see more and more standard players switching to Modern, as a matter of fact I've seen a lot of people on the forums stating they are migrating from Standard to Modern, and I don't see how that is good in a business perspective for Wizard, because once again, it doesn't take much to realize how Standard is a pyramid scheme, and that's not even taking into account how the most common advice given to a new player is "don't get into standard, it's a money sink, get into "insert eternal format, Modern most of the times" because you can get even semi competitive decks for less than 100.- that you will be able to play FOREVER".
Also that Standard to Modern migration we can already see will in turn drive the Modern staples prices even more.
I wonder what will happen when all the "investors" will sell all their staples at the same time because the price will be so high their "hold it" policy won't resist it, and the prices will be so high no one will be willing to spit hundreds of dollars for a freaking fetch card that should be an uncommon to begin with.
So yeah, current state of the game is fine, nothing needs to be changed and WoTC is gonna be eternally profitable. Everyone loves paying hundreds of dollars for a piece of paper or for an imaginary card on MTGO, because everyone is into Magic as an "investor", no one is in really for the "game". Everyone who's hardcore into a hobby loves to be treated the way WotC treats its customers and its original fanbase.
Ho and MTGO is perfect, it's clearly ludicrous to imagine something similar to Pokemon could be applied to MTG, we all loooooove to pay 80 usd for a single Tarmogoyf card in a computer program.
Guys.....it's just a hobby, it's supposed to be for fun and enjoyment. If you're not happy with it, if it no longer brings you joy and happiness, if it only makes you angry/bitter/argumentative with other people....then why are you still playing? Is it because "well I've invested this much time in it, so dammit I'm going to just keep soldering on!!"?
If you're honestly this angry, then put your money where your mouth is and stop buying cards. Stop feeding the beast that you hate so much. Go find another hobby and leave the rest of us who still actually find enjoyment in the game in peace. Go check out Fantasy Flight Games' line of LCGs, go check out this 'Force of Will' game that I keep hearing is "so good", maybe get into another aspect of hobby gaming (board games, war games, RPGS, etc etc).
There's literally nothing wrong with stopping playing, either temporarily (until a set you like shows up, or WOTC policy changes), or even permanently if you are no longer enjoying it.
The state of the game is in constant flux, I didn't start playing until around 1999, but I've seen a pattern of "really awesome sets and decisions" followed by "mediocre set and poor decisions" which tends to occur every 2 years or so. Literally take a year off, come back when the tide is in again
I wish to add: Sometimes, I am too stubborn to change CCG and felt helpless with the rising MTG card prices. I just need to vent somewhere and learn to deal with it.
Magic feels like it is in a bubble. An macro-economic one that I find rather fascinating. The number of "investor players" appears to just keep going up. Completely anecdotal comment, but go look at the volume of magic investment advice content on the internet. Then you have the secondary market which is completely dominated by SCG, CF, and TCGplayer. Disagree? Go sell a card to someone. Anyone that is into magic. First thing that happens is the buyer will open up his phone and check one of those sites.
Pricing appears to be fixed and is set by one or two entities. Pricing is also strongly influenced by those same entities through their stable of pro-players; what decks they play and what articles they write.
Then you have WotC, the source. The seem very content to feed the secondary market and allow those three big sellers to manage and control it. I believe this is because those same three are, by far, their biggest purchasers of sealed product. How many boxes do you imagine SCG orders to fill their pre-order sales for these spoiled mythics?
Now, I'm not crying evil here. Though, I suspect a good deal of market price fixing is involved. Which would be illegal in a commodities market if anyone actually cared about a stupid card game. ;). But. There is nothing unusual with WotC catering to their biggest clients and market. What is problematic is when those actions begin to warp the market.
Mythic Rares. They went from Jonny player bait to now being the home for playable staples. It was inevitable really. WotC is in the business of selling product. As players stopped buying sealed product and increasingly went to the secondary market, WotC shifted to feeding them. By making the best cards mythic you reduce the volume of them in each box. Secondary market has to buy more boxes to fill demand.
Then the question is: what is the driving force for the demand?
If it increasingly speculators, as I suspect, then a crash is inevitable. Go read up on commodity market theory. False (speculator) demand cannot be sustained. But it can grossly inflate prices in the short term.
People playing the cards, the game, is the real demand. As long as that real demand is willing to keep paying everything keeps rolling. Like the housing market crash, though, the cliff can come up quick. Suddenly you realize the demand for your box of Gorfs is just other investors that only want the cards to sell. To other investors? Wait...
That is the moment markets crash.
Magic has competitors. Players have options. They are taking note of the inflated prices to play competitive constructed. Oh, and noticing WotC increasingly screwing them on sealed products and top-heavy sets full of cash-mythics.
Yea, I think the aging of the player base is a factor that a lot of people don't think about. There are a lot more 25-30 year old people who are active gamers now than there were when Mirage was the new set. That is going to mean more can be spent on the game, so the price of cards will creep up to meet that consumer.
I think that WOTC needs to make each set a lot smaller but with an eye of making each card reasonable in Constructed formats. This would mean jettisoning the Limited formats, but this is the only way to sell more Constructed playable cards. The drop in booster sales from losing Draft and Sealed, would most likely be offset by the fact that constructed playable cards would be more reasonably purchased by buying boosters rather than singles. This would also allow for a more liberal reprint policy for Modern as both Modern Masters sets were hampered by having to make then work in Limited.
Here's what I think the is biggest problem with the way the magic market works. People who have been around have had time to build up capital in the form of cards, new players have not. Because of this, older players don't mind the constant price inflation, they don't need to buy nearly as many as cards as new players do. You get a situation where almost all of the actual cash money put into the system comes from newer players. This is made worse when WOTC only prints a single eternal, or even modern playable card in a set. Its also really frustrating when you cant trade standard cards for anything other than standard cards. I would not be surprised if WOTC was doing this on purpose to keep people playing standard. Aside from the secondary market and card prices, I think the game is in a decent state. Modern is alright, Legacy is great, and while too expensive to play for me, standard at least looks like it has some fun decision trees, lands in particular.
I think that WOTC needs to make each set a lot smaller but with an eye of making each card reasonable in Constructed formats. This would mean jettisoning the Limited formats, but this is the only way to sell more Constructed playable cards. The drop in booster sales from losing Draft and Sealed, would most likely be offset by the fact that constructed playable cards would be more reasonably purchased by buying boosters rather than singles. This would also allow for a more liberal reprint policy for Modern as both Modern Masters sets were hampered by having to make then work in Limited.
The problem with that is that the market would correct. If the EV of a pack is above MSRP, then the a LGS will just open packs instead of selling them. You either get nothing worth anything with an unlimited print run, or massively inflated booster prices with a limited one.
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Legacy
Death and Taxes Pauper
UB Teachings
Tortured Existence
Murasa Tron Modern
Pod (RIP)
Bloom(RIP)
Merfolk
There's too much whining in this thread. I got back into Magic after a 17 year break two months ago and I am very impressed with the way the game has evolved since then. The way WOTC interacts and guides the community through FNMs, the judge program and so on is a huge leap from way back when. Although the price of singles have risen considerably (not too impressed by the Mythic rarity), the Modern format is a great evolution where you can really stick with a deck for a long time. Sure the price of entry can be steep, but there is little danger of the cards becoming worthless since they don't rotate - so you can probably sell them again if you want to.
Limited is SOOO much better than it was in the early days, I love the synergy effects. The coverage of major events both by WOTC and independents is quite impressive.
There are way too many combo decks though!
I have to admit I lol'ed at the luxury hobby remark. My other hobbies are track day cars and wine and those are a LOT more expensive. WOTC said they have a goal of magic not costing more than $1000 or so per year for players to stay competitive. I think they have succeeded with that goal and I don't think $20 per week is very expensive at all. Of course it's a lot of money considering it's just pieces of cardboard, but it's not pricey compared to most other hobbies.
There's too much whining in this thread. I got back into Magic after a 17 year break two months ago and I am very impressed with the way the game has evolved since then. The way WOTC interacts and guides the community through FNMs, the judge program and so on is a huge leap from way back when. Although the price of singles have risen considerably (not too impressed by the Mythic rarity), the Modern format is a great evolution where you can really stick with a deck for a long time. Sure the price of entry can be steep, but there is little danger of the cards becoming worthless since they don't rotate - so you can probably sell them again if you want to.
Limited is SOOO much better than it was in the early days, I love the synergy effects. The coverage of major events both by WOTC and independents is quite impressive.
There are way too many combo decks though!
I have to admit I lol'ed at the luxury hobby remark. My other hobbies are track day cars and wine and those are a LOT more expensive. WOTC said they have a goal of magic not costing more than $1000 or so per year for players to stay competitive. I think they have succeeded with that goal and I don't think $20 per week is very expensive at all. Of course it's a lot of money considering it's just pieces of cardboard, but it's not pricey compared to most other hobbies.
Do you have a source on that? As far as I know, wizards doesn't comment on the secondary market at all.
And if you compare competitive magic to other tabletop gaming hobbies, which I really think is more valid than something like wine or cars, competitive magic is probably the most expensive out of the lot.
I can't find the link now but I read it just a couple of days ago. It was an article (or a quote from a book?) about how WOTC decided to make an effort to make MTG into a sport with the first pro-tour, in an effort to ensure it's longevity. And when creating their strategy for this, they studied other low level sports like basketball. This is how they decided on the ballpark cost - which was actually $900 at the time and not $1000 if I remember correctly. Introducing sealed and draft was an important part of this strategy, as a way to ensure high level of competition without requiring a massively high cost of entry.
So to be clear the $900 was a target from other competitive hobbies/sports and not tabletop gaming or sports cars because WOTC did not think that made sense as a comparison. But I'm not exactly talking about the secondary market. I'm talking about the cost of staying competitive throughout the year. It could be interpreted to buying 9 display boxes, and this should give you enough cards to trade to get your constructed decks competitive.
When you're talking about Garfield's original vision about players buying lots of deckmaster games with a starter and a couple of boosters from each, it makes a lot of sense to compare it with tabletop gaming. But it didn't take many months to see that this is something completely different to that.
after typing this up I think it might have been a reddit thread where some former employees talked about their history with WOTC.
On another note, I am puzzled by the complaints about secondary market prices. As long as boosters are printed to demand this surely regulates itself for any currently in print set? And since WOTC decided to abandon the reserved list no card should spiral completely out of reach. Unless it's a legacy card of course, but that's a silly format anyway ;-)
As I mentioned I'm not too thrilled by the mythic rarity at all. But magic is setting new sales records every year since 2009 so they must be doing something right.
You cant have competitive magic or talk about prices without the secondary market as long as you can't buy cards you need from wizards. Its statistically cheaper to get the cards you need directly than it is to crack boosters, or even crack boosters+trade. This actually is a important distinction between magic and wargaming stuff. If I'm playing warhammer, and I need a squad of guardsmen, I don't have to buy IG boosters until I pull what I need.(I'm sure that GW would do that if they could though). In magic, if I need a specific card, I either have to play the lottery, or go to the secondary market. If you can buy exactly what you need from the manufacturer, that sets a much harder cap on prices.
Most of the complaints about secondary market prices are directed at modern, where wizards has made a seemingly intentional decision to avoid reprinting ubiquitous format staples in a manner that would have a real impact on the price. Also that the playerbase has utterly exploded in size in the past few years, and cards are shooting up to match.
Regarding legacy, I really wish the reserve list would go away, its not fun to have spent years trading into a format, and then having the same 10 people show up every week.
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy
Death and Taxes Pauper
UB Teachings
Tortured Existence
Murasa Tron Modern
Pod (RIP)
Bloom(RIP)
Merfolk
On another note, I am puzzled by the complaints about secondary market prices. As long as boosters are printed to demand this surely regulates itself for any currently in print set?
This is only true if all or nearly all the boosters printed are actually opened. If a set is not well received, it is not opened to the degree a better received set is. Also, the secondary market can control prices by limiting how much is opened. Maybe not intentionally, but LGSs have to leave boxes unopened to sell to those that want a booster box.
I believe that boosters would be opened more if there was a greater percentage of Constructed useful cards in a booster. As it is, if you open a booster you may get exactly one useful card. If you are lucky.
Regarding legacy, I really wish the reserve list would go away, its not fun to have spent years trading into a format, and then having the same 10 people show up every week.
Locally we have Legacy tournaments that allow full proxy. A lot of people without the cards take advantage of it, and those of us with the cards get to play them. It has actually encouraged several people to build/mostly build Legacy decks which has been great for the store since they can sell more cards. Since they're proxy the tournaments are naturally unsanctioned though. And tying into the theme of Wizards horrible PR they actually found out we were doing unsanctioned proxy tournaments (I think from my post here in the places to play legacy thread) and punished the store for holding them reducing future product and making several threats. The store owner though told them to go f themselves, it's unsanctioned so it's not their call, and it's his store.
i wonder....how do they sell more cards through that, when all cards can just be proxied?
If i proxie one card, i can as well proxie the whole deck, there is only a diffrence in degree.
If i proxie anyway, why spend money on cards at all?
Ive seen whole play groups of people do this, and it gets old real fast with no limits and no structure it becomes boring. its like eating sweets instead of real food, might seem great but its not healthy in the end.
its also not legal in any sanctioned tournament, shops wont let u play in any paid event, a lot of players wont even play with u if all u do is proxie, you also miss out on collecting and trading. in short your cheating your self.
i wonder....how do they sell more cards through that, when all cards can just be proxied?
If i proxie one card, i can as well proxie the whole deck, there is only a diffrence in degree.
If i proxie anyway, why spend money on cards at all?
I feel MrAtomic to be slightly extreme.
Well, your thoughts are valid but only for a certain sector of players.
Some players, playing in the full proxied tournament must be showing interest in said format and hesitated in entering into said format due to certain insecurities.
Thus, that tournament served as a means for them to re-access and hopefully, they will adopt said format.
(think of it as promoter giving food samples. Sure, you can always have your urge satisfied with food samples but if you want to indulge in that Chicken Noodles Soup, you need to buy it.)
i wonder....how do they sell more cards through that, when all cards can just be proxied?
If i proxie one card, i can as well proxie the whole deck, there is only a diffrence in degree.
If i proxie anyway, why spend money on cards at all?
Because people find what decks they like, they learn about the format, and they eventually reach a point where they want to play sanctioned events in it. Playing with proxys limits you to just a handful of tournaments that allow them while having the real cards lets you play in real events. Proxies have motivated people to buy real cards, and they get people into the store on Legacy nights. It has been fantastic, I've been able to finish a second Legacy deck in the past year for example by showing up to these events, winning store credit, and buying cards with that plus my usual Magic budget while still having been able to play it for the past year.
Because we have proxy Legacy tournaments, we can run a 15ish person Legacy tournament every Thursday night as well as bigger actually sanctioned (so not proxy) tournaments every couple months. Then it encourages people to travel a couple towns over and play those occasional Legacy tournaments, and to attend Opens/GP's that are Legacy. I know that sending an extra 10 people to Opens/GP's when they're in town is a drop in the bucket but it's still more interest in supporting large tournaments, and that wouldn't happen if nothing ever got them interested in the format in the first place.
Yes there's the people who just proxy all the time and don't want to play sanctioned Legacy, but you know what? Those are still opponents for the rest of us to play against and get matchup experience with. It's also people that are coming into the store and paying tournament entry fees that make it more attractive to the rest of us to play.
Of course, if Wizards had it their way we would have none of that.
Well, good on that store owner. What sort of threats did they make?
I don't know all the details but they threatened to cut his allotment of supplemental products, less promotional material, and so on. Personally, I agree with the store owner. If you're running sanctioned tournaments you should abide by Wizards rules since that's what sanctioning means but if you're doing unsanctioned (which anything using proxies always is, and should be) it's up to the store to run it in whatever manner they deem fit. Wizards has no more right to try and dictate how an LGS does business than Apple does to tell iPhone owners how to act in public.
I don't know all the details but they threatened to cut his allotment of supplemental products, less promotional material, and so on. Personally, I agree with the store owner. If you're running sanctioned tournaments you should abide by Wizards rules since that's what sanctioning means but if you're doing unsanctioned (which anything using proxies always is, and should be) it's up to the store to run it in whatever manner they deem fit. Wizards has no more right to try and dictate how an LGS does business than Apple does to tell iPhone owners how to act in public.
WotC = Thug life!
From what i heard from my LGS, the relationship between WotC and LGS isnt that good but its due to commercial reasons..
I stopped playing after Khans, I couldn't keep playing for hours a night with college winding down, and honestly the community of people around me are really distasteful.
I now have only one EDH and modern deck, which I plan to keep for the future in case I get the urge to play again for whatever reason. I look back and regret a lot of the money I've sunk into the game, especially on pure chaff like Theros. I'm playing Hearthstone, and love the fact that I can dive into a game for a few minutes if I want to play with an amazing UI and no secondary market to tie up the value of cards.
I wish my 4/4s with haste and first strike that acted as Goblin Warchiefs were better and didn't die to instants and overshadowed all other 4 drops in the format. And that they had evasion too, and some way to dodge wrath effects.
from a store view. any way they can get players in they'll do. those players buy snacks, mats, dice and whatever. helping mtg in a general way. uncool if wotc snubs their nose at the store just because they allow proxy play?? wizards doesn't even support legacy. what should they care?
FFG would disagree with the concept that LCG's are not as popular as CCG's. The genre of The CCG as a whole in the gaming industry is dead. That's why everybody is switching over to an LCG format in the industry for new card games and to a lesser extent on board games. It's also why Pandemic and Risk and many others are offering ways to play a board game twenty times before it wears out (Legacy board game formats exist in Risk and Pandemic Legacy is selling in obscene amounts). It's more cost-effective. It's easier for a player to keep up with a $20 outlay a month then $60 to play FNM draft four times and get 95% product that ceases usability after one-use. No? People draft and then leave 57 cards on the table or even directly throw them away afterwards on a Friday Night. It's like a movie or dinner though. FNM is pay for entertainment. That's fine too. They also burn through players constantly. People play for a bit, get disillusioned by the cost, and quit. There are always more suckers though. Which is why they push Standard so hard. All you have to do is replace the people who leave with new people coming in at a constant or growing rate. Rinse and repeat.
They can disagree all they like but if you look at attendance number for the FFG World Championship events they are nowhere close to Magic.
Just about every popular LCG FFG currently makes is based on an IP that failed as a CCG.
CCGs aren't dead it's just not a format that allows for dozens of them to exist.
When I say the CCG market is dead it means that no new CCG's are actively produced each year. At least none that are successful for any period of time. FFG is too busy making twenty good product lines as well. They don't focus on one product only. Other than Magic WotC is slowly killing off all its other product lines, managing to screw up D&D as a license, and slapping Magic as a loose theme on products just to sell them (Magic Heroscape). Which is what they should do. Focus on the only thing they do well at this point. They've also shown us that the collectibility aspect of the game is far more important than the game itself. In everything from slap on the wrist penalties for cheating on tournaments to multi-year bans for leaks and issues not even related to the competitive scene (which is what keeps Magic viable). Counterfeits are the newest issue they need answers for and aren't willing to fix.
When I say the CCG market is dead it means that no new CCG's are actively produced each year. At least none that are successful for any period of time. FFG is too busy making twenty good product lines as well. They don't focus on one product only. Other than Magic WotC is slowly killing off all its other product lines, managing to screw up D&D as a license, and slapping Magic as a loose theme on products just to sell them (Magic Heroscape). Which is what they should do. Focus on the only thing they do well at this point. They've also shown us that the collectibility aspect of the game is far more important than the game itself. In everything from slap on the wrist penalties for cheating on tournaments to multi-year bans for leaks and issues not even related to the competitive scene (which is what keeps Magic viable). Counterfeits are the newest issue they need answers for and aren't willing to fix.
They've pretty much deleted counterfeiting of newer cards with the hologram.
There aren't that many new airplane designs being created either, are airplanes dead? Like I said, the CCG market just doesn't allow for dozens of them to exist.
Whatever your opinion of Hasbro/WotC and CCGs in general, Magic alone is still way more popular/profitable then every LCG FFG makes combined.
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While I think most all of the criticism here is valid, one thing I put no stock in is Hearthstone being any kind of threat to Magic. Yeah its free but it's also BORING as **** after about 2 weeks. I'd even venture to say most of the fun is from unlocking stuff in game rather than the actual play. It's almost no different than the WoW tcg and that didn't last all that long. Furthermore it has a smaller card pool and the same "power is concentrated in a small number of cards" problems. In general there is less diversity cards, mechanics and formats, its fun for a while, but when it gets old it gets old fast. Everyone I know that played it went from playing all the time to, "meh I'm done playing that altogether" in a matter of days.
I'm not sure why that was an issue for you. All that extra stuff is entirely, well...extra. A Standard or Modern player, who plays no other formats, need not ever pay attention to these extra sets. If you do play other formats then, well, they are printing extra stuff for you that normally would never make it into a set designed and developed for Standard, so that seems like a good thing. Assuming you are not compelled to buy all things MTG, I can't really see the downside.
MaRo has written about this before, and I can't recall all the reasons, but the reason for this example is that "Llanowar" is tied to Dominaria. When the Core Sets stopped being 100% reprints they started to be tied to the actual block stories more an more, and since the story line has not returned to Dominaria in some time it doesn't make much since to have the Llanowar name associated with a card. Mystic Elves, however, is much more generic and when you are talking about a card that will likely be reprinted quite a bit you need it to fit on every plane. As far as I know this new name treatment has only been given to commons. I know that they have made exceptions in recent years to the pain lands, and I think this is because they needed them in Standard and it would have bothered players too much to reprint a rare land with a lot of history under a new name. Plus they didn't have to commission new art.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
When we'll reach a point that even "casual decks" will be 300+ usd, I wonder how many new players will be willing to try MTG.
Also, plenty of people seem to take the Standard's appeal and success for granted, but if they keep designing sets where the format staples are almost exclusively Mythics and rares the standard inflation isn't gonna get better any time soon, and that problem has gotten worse with the new rotation rules.
I'm quiet sure we're gonna see more and more standard players switching to Modern, as a matter of fact I've seen a lot of people on the forums stating they are migrating from Standard to Modern, and I don't see how that is good in a business perspective for Wizard, because once again, it doesn't take much to realize how Standard is a pyramid scheme, and that's not even taking into account how the most common advice given to a new player is "don't get into standard, it's a money sink, get into "insert eternal format, Modern most of the times" because you can get even semi competitive decks for less than 100.- that you will be able to play FOREVER".
Also that Standard to Modern migration we can already see will in turn drive the Modern staples prices even more.
I wonder what will happen when all the "investors" will sell all their staples at the same time because the price will be so high their "hold it" policy won't resist it, and the prices will be so high no one will be willing to spit hundreds of dollars for a freaking fetch card that should be an uncommon to begin with.
So yeah, current state of the game is fine, nothing needs to be changed and WoTC is gonna be eternally profitable. Everyone loves paying hundreds of dollars for a piece of paper or for an imaginary card on MTGO, because everyone is into Magic as an "investor", no one is in really for the "game". Everyone who's hardcore into a hobby loves to be treated the way WotC treats its customers and its original fanbase.
Ho and MTGO is perfect, it's clearly ludicrous to imagine something similar to Pokemon could be applied to MTG, we all loooooove to pay 80 usd for a single Tarmogoyf card in a computer program.
If you're honestly this angry, then put your money where your mouth is and stop buying cards. Stop feeding the beast that you hate so much. Go find another hobby and leave the rest of us who still actually find enjoyment in the game in peace. Go check out Fantasy Flight Games' line of LCGs, go check out this 'Force of Will' game that I keep hearing is "so good", maybe get into another aspect of hobby gaming (board games, war games, RPGS, etc etc).
There's literally nothing wrong with stopping playing, either temporarily (until a set you like shows up, or WOTC policy changes), or even permanently if you are no longer enjoying it.
The state of the game is in constant flux, I didn't start playing until around 1999, but I've seen a pattern of "really awesome sets and decisions" followed by "mediocre set and poor decisions" which tends to occur every 2 years or so. Literally take a year off, come back when the tide is in again
My current trade binder.
"People most likely to cry "troll" are those who can't fathom holding a position for reasons unrelated to how they want to be perceived"
I wish to add: Sometimes, I am too stubborn to change CCG and felt helpless with the rising MTG card prices. I just need to vent somewhere and learn to deal with it.
Pricing appears to be fixed and is set by one or two entities. Pricing is also strongly influenced by those same entities through their stable of pro-players; what decks they play and what articles they write.
Then you have WotC, the source. The seem very content to feed the secondary market and allow those three big sellers to manage and control it. I believe this is because those same three are, by far, their biggest purchasers of sealed product. How many boxes do you imagine SCG orders to fill their pre-order sales for these spoiled mythics?
Now, I'm not crying evil here. Though, I suspect a good deal of market price fixing is involved. Which would be illegal in a commodities market if anyone actually cared about a stupid card game. ;). But. There is nothing unusual with WotC catering to their biggest clients and market. What is problematic is when those actions begin to warp the market.
Mythic Rares. They went from Jonny player bait to now being the home for playable staples. It was inevitable really. WotC is in the business of selling product. As players stopped buying sealed product and increasingly went to the secondary market, WotC shifted to feeding them. By making the best cards mythic you reduce the volume of them in each box. Secondary market has to buy more boxes to fill demand.
Players keep buying mythics for $30 plus. $80 plus. Feedback loop continues.
Then the question is: what is the driving force for the demand?
If it increasingly speculators, as I suspect, then a crash is inevitable. Go read up on commodity market theory. False (speculator) demand cannot be sustained. But it can grossly inflate prices in the short term.
People playing the cards, the game, is the real demand. As long as that real demand is willing to keep paying everything keeps rolling. Like the housing market crash, though, the cliff can come up quick. Suddenly you realize the demand for your box of Gorfs is just other investors that only want the cards to sell. To other investors? Wait...
That is the moment markets crash.
Magic has competitors. Players have options. They are taking note of the inflated prices to play competitive constructed. Oh, and noticing WotC increasingly screwing them on sealed products and top-heavy sets full of cash-mythics.
Just saying.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
The problem with that is that the market would correct. If the EV of a pack is above MSRP, then the a LGS will just open packs instead of selling them. You either get nothing worth anything with an unlimited print run, or massively inflated booster prices with a limited one.
Death and Taxes
Pauper
UB Teachings
Tortured Existence
Murasa Tron
Modern
Pod (RIP)
Bloom(RIP)
Merfolk
Limited is SOOO much better than it was in the early days, I love the synergy effects. The coverage of major events both by WOTC and independents is quite impressive.
There are way too many combo decks though!
I have to admit I lol'ed at the luxury hobby remark. My other hobbies are track day cars and wine and those are a LOT more expensive. WOTC said they have a goal of magic not costing more than $1000 or so per year for players to stay competitive. I think they have succeeded with that goal and I don't think $20 per week is very expensive at all. Of course it's a lot of money considering it's just pieces of cardboard, but it's not pricey compared to most other hobbies.
Do you have a source on that? As far as I know, wizards doesn't comment on the secondary market at all.
And if you compare competitive magic to other tabletop gaming hobbies, which I really think is more valid than something like wine or cars, competitive magic is probably the most expensive out of the lot.
Death and Taxes
Pauper
UB Teachings
Tortured Existence
Murasa Tron
Modern
Pod (RIP)
Bloom(RIP)
Merfolk
So to be clear the $900 was a target from other competitive hobbies/sports and not tabletop gaming or sports cars because WOTC did not think that made sense as a comparison. But I'm not exactly talking about the secondary market. I'm talking about the cost of staying competitive throughout the year. It could be interpreted to buying 9 display boxes, and this should give you enough cards to trade to get your constructed decks competitive.
When you're talking about Garfield's original vision about players buying lots of deckmaster games with a starter and a couple of boosters from each, it makes a lot of sense to compare it with tabletop gaming. But it didn't take many months to see that this is something completely different to that.
after typing this up I think it might have been a reddit thread where some former employees talked about their history with WOTC.
On another note, I am puzzled by the complaints about secondary market prices. As long as boosters are printed to demand this surely regulates itself for any currently in print set? And since WOTC decided to abandon the reserved list no card should spiral completely out of reach. Unless it's a legacy card of course, but that's a silly format anyway ;-)
As I mentioned I'm not too thrilled by the mythic rarity at all. But magic is setting new sales records every year since 2009 so they must be doing something right.
Most of the complaints about secondary market prices are directed at modern, where wizards has made a seemingly intentional decision to avoid reprinting ubiquitous format staples in a manner that would have a real impact on the price. Also that the playerbase has utterly exploded in size in the past few years, and cards are shooting up to match.
Regarding legacy, I really wish the reserve list would go away, its not fun to have spent years trading into a format, and then having the same 10 people show up every week.
Death and Taxes
Pauper
UB Teachings
Tortured Existence
Murasa Tron
Modern
Pod (RIP)
Bloom(RIP)
Merfolk
This is only true if all or nearly all the boosters printed are actually opened. If a set is not well received, it is not opened to the degree a better received set is. Also, the secondary market can control prices by limiting how much is opened. Maybe not intentionally, but LGSs have to leave boxes unopened to sell to those that want a booster box.
I believe that boosters would be opened more if there was a greater percentage of Constructed useful cards in a booster. As it is, if you open a booster you may get exactly one useful card. If you are lucky.
Locally we have Legacy tournaments that allow full proxy. A lot of people without the cards take advantage of it, and those of us with the cards get to play them. It has actually encouraged several people to build/mostly build Legacy decks which has been great for the store since they can sell more cards. Since they're proxy the tournaments are naturally unsanctioned though. And tying into the theme of Wizards horrible PR they actually found out we were doing unsanctioned proxy tournaments (I think from my post here in the places to play legacy thread) and punished the store for holding them reducing future product and making several threats. The store owner though told them to go f themselves, it's unsanctioned so it's not their call, and it's his store.
Ive seen whole play groups of people do this, and it gets old real fast with no limits and no structure it becomes boring. its like eating sweets instead of real food, might seem great but its not healthy in the end.
its also not legal in any sanctioned tournament, shops wont let u play in any paid event, a lot of players wont even play with u if all u do is proxie, you also miss out on collecting and trading. in short your cheating your self.
Death and Taxes
Pauper
UB Teachings
Tortured Existence
Murasa Tron
Modern
Pod (RIP)
Bloom(RIP)
Merfolk
I feel MrAtomic to be slightly extreme.
Well, your thoughts are valid but only for a certain sector of players.
Some players, playing in the full proxied tournament must be showing interest in said format and hesitated in entering into said format due to certain insecurities.
Thus, that tournament served as a means for them to re-access and hopefully, they will adopt said format.
(think of it as promoter giving food samples. Sure, you can always have your urge satisfied with food samples but if you want to indulge in that Chicken Noodles Soup, you need to buy it.)
Because people find what decks they like, they learn about the format, and they eventually reach a point where they want to play sanctioned events in it. Playing with proxys limits you to just a handful of tournaments that allow them while having the real cards lets you play in real events. Proxies have motivated people to buy real cards, and they get people into the store on Legacy nights. It has been fantastic, I've been able to finish a second Legacy deck in the past year for example by showing up to these events, winning store credit, and buying cards with that plus my usual Magic budget while still having been able to play it for the past year.
Because we have proxy Legacy tournaments, we can run a 15ish person Legacy tournament every Thursday night as well as bigger actually sanctioned (so not proxy) tournaments every couple months. Then it encourages people to travel a couple towns over and play those occasional Legacy tournaments, and to attend Opens/GP's that are Legacy. I know that sending an extra 10 people to Opens/GP's when they're in town is a drop in the bucket but it's still more interest in supporting large tournaments, and that wouldn't happen if nothing ever got them interested in the format in the first place.
Yes there's the people who just proxy all the time and don't want to play sanctioned Legacy, but you know what? Those are still opponents for the rest of us to play against and get matchup experience with. It's also people that are coming into the store and paying tournament entry fees that make it more attractive to the rest of us to play.
Of course, if Wizards had it their way we would have none of that.
I don't know all the details but they threatened to cut his allotment of supplemental products, less promotional material, and so on. Personally, I agree with the store owner. If you're running sanctioned tournaments you should abide by Wizards rules since that's what sanctioning means but if you're doing unsanctioned (which anything using proxies always is, and should be) it's up to the store to run it in whatever manner they deem fit. Wizards has no more right to try and dictate how an LGS does business than Apple does to tell iPhone owners how to act in public.
WotC = Thug life!
From what i heard from my LGS, the relationship between WotC and LGS isnt that good but its due to commercial reasons..
I now have only one EDH and modern deck, which I plan to keep for the future in case I get the urge to play again for whatever reason. I look back and regret a lot of the money I've sunk into the game, especially on pure chaff like Theros. I'm playing Hearthstone, and love the fact that I can dive into a game for a few minutes if I want to play with an amazing UI and no secondary market to tie up the value of cards.
My current decks!
http://tappedout.net/users/ThePhasewalker/
They can disagree all they like but if you look at attendance number for the FFG World Championship events they are nowhere close to Magic.
Just about every popular LCG FFG currently makes is based on an IP that failed as a CCG.
CCGs aren't dead it's just not a format that allows for dozens of them to exist.
They've pretty much deleted counterfeiting of newer cards with the hologram.
There aren't that many new airplane designs being created either, are airplanes dead? Like I said, the CCG market just doesn't allow for dozens of them to exist.
Whatever your opinion of Hasbro/WotC and CCGs in general, Magic alone is still way more popular/profitable then every LCG FFG makes combined.