Imagine for one moment that MTG released tins every month of the year. A tin with let's say four standard booster packs, a promo (AND A NICE ONE!). Some sort of code you could redeem on MTGO and maybe also things similar to figures or pins.
Sell it for a competitive price to stores and let everyone make money again. Something like 15 - 20 dollars, US to stores. Let them either sell it sealed for 25 or 30 or let them break the product to see if they can maximise profit.
There is so much money to be had if they could do the type of sealed product that Nintendo makes.
Why would people want to buy a casual product like that over say, the builders toolkit, that already comes with 4 booster packs, 125 semi-randomized cards, 100 basic lands, a couple guides and some useful boxes for about $20? Sure it would be cool to have something different like a tin but isn't that worse on cards for storing than boxes? Also, everyone loves promos but for that price couldn't they just get the box store packs with 3 boosters and 2 promos for like $12-$13 and be better off? I know you mentioned some other extra stuff but I feel like it would have to be some good stuff to make it worth it for someone to buy a casual product for $25-$30 bucks when there is already stuff that offers more cardboard for less money.
If you're not familiar with the Pokemon TCG you probably misunderstand what the tin products are used for.
There are quarterly tins, usually a set of 2 to 4. They do contain 4 booster packs from the Standard current when they come out. Most importantly is that the promos in them are almost always $8-12 cards that are staples in a tournament archetype. That's the real purpose of the tins - the company that does Pokemon TCG uses them to keep the prices in check and help ease of access into playing the game. They also regularly put out their own version of duel decks that contain about half of the common/uncommon staples you need for any given Standard deck and always include ones that get up to the $10+ mark.
The Pokemon TCG is very very good about keeping the cost of playing the game in check. There are tons of box and promo products for casual players and Pokemon fans alike that aren't necessarily the best for getting into tournament play, but they also make sure that those wanting to get into tournament play aren't left in the dust. I decided a while ago that if I want to play a TCG competitively, it will probably be the Pokemon TCG because of how much better they are than Wizards at reprinting and keeping the secondary market in check through product. I'll always play Magic and be drafting, doing EDH and the occasional Grand Prix side events, but Pokemon has been thriving for years and is more popular than ever because of how accessible all the facets of the game are.
Agreed. If MTG did tins we wouldn't have such nightmare fuel prices in standard and modern. Well, Modern is a different can of worms, but they definitely could keep standard in check with having mythic tins and other promotionals. Hopefully the CEO does something to change how they are doing things or we are going to be doomed to be paying hundreds of dollars for a few pieces of cardboard.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I'm not going to deny that such products will be better for the consumer (including me), but I can see quite obviously why WotC doesn't do that for MTG (and don't really fault them for it, considering the entire game exists to make profit).
It's definitely safe to say MTG is larger than Pokemon and as a result, has a larger, more accessible secondary market. As a result, players are more confident of buying boxes since they know that even the jank rares have a decent chance of being sold (even at a loss). When given a choice between a non-randomized product and a randomized one, the randomized one will definitely yield more money in the primary market (which is why unless you invest in thousands of a single card you don't make a lot out of the absolutely non-randomized secondary market).
Pokemon doesn't have the player base nor the market size to induce that confidence - I'm pretty sure the average "box-opening" player in MTG opens more boxes than those in Pokemon. They need to induce confidence in their game and hence these tins with playable promos help in that. While this has the benefit of helping keep prices low and affordable, I do not believe that is the primary intent of the company, only a secondary one to inducing confidence to the game itself (or more like using affordable prices to do so, but still a secondary point), that's honestly just consumer bias imagining the company places their consumers' interests in the first place (it's always second and in support to their own, no matter how marketing has you believe).
Back to MTG, one of the TCGs with the most solid player base (despite all the vocals of "I'm leaving"), they don't really have a need to reinforce confidence in their game (not until the whole recent ban-debacle, but that's another more recent issue).
Note I'm stating all this in regards to Standard. Contrary to what I said, because WotC said they don't interfere in Modern, such products will actually help out Modern a lot - the promo doesn't even have to be a rare - a promo Lightning Bolt and 4 random non-Standard Modern booster reprints for Modern (or Modern Masters if printing logistics is an issue) in a quarterly tin would be great for the format - people might be more willing to risk packs if there's a foil staple in there.
I'm not going to deny that such products will be better for the consumer (including me), but I can see quite obviously why WotC doesn't do that for MTG (and don't really fault them for it, considering the entire game exists to make profit now).
It's definitely safe to say MTG is larger than Pokemon and as a result, has a larger, more accessible secondary market. As a result, players are more confident of buying boxes since they know that even the jank rares have a decent chance of being sold (even at a loss). When given a choice between a non-randomized product and a randomized one, the randomized one will definitely yield more money in the primary market (which is why unless you invest in thousands of a single card you don't make a lot out of the absolutely non-randomized secondary market).
Pokemon doesn't have the player base nor the market size to induce that confidence - I'm pretty sure the average "box-opening" player in MTG opens more boxes than those in Pokemon. They need to induce confidence in their game and hence these tins with playable promos help in that. While this has the benefit of helping keep prices low and affordable, I do not believe that is the primary intent of the company, only a secondary one to inducing confidence to the game itself (or more like using affordable prices to do so, but still a secondary point), that's honestly just consumer bias imagining the company places their consumers' interests in the first place (it's always second and in support to their own, no matter how marketing has you believe).
Back to MTG, one of the TCGs with the most solid player base (despite all the vocals of "I'm leaving"), they don't really have a need to reinforce confidence in their game (not until the whole recent ban-debacle, but that's another more recent issue).
Note I'm stating all this in regards to Standard. Contrary to what I said, because WotC said they don't interfere in Modern, such products will actually help out Modern a lot - the promo doesn't even have to be a rare - a promo Lightning Bolt and 4 random non-Standard Modern booster reprints for Modern (or Modern Masters if printing logistics is an issue) in a quarterly tin would be great for the format - people might be more willing to risk packs if there's a foil staple in there.
No, the real reason is that the CEO in charge of Pokemon simply had a better game plan than the CEO in charge of MtG. The basic fact is that if they actually did tins like they do in Pokemon we'd never see Kolitas or Gideon go over 20, let alone 15 usd, and the same can be said of Torrential Gearhulk. The problem that Wizards does not address with MtG that Hasbro does address is the extreme pressure on specific key cards needed for decks. If they handle those situations by printing tins mid standard containing boosters for the latest expansion and the key card as a promo on the front, along with digital code, it would greatly even out the prices on the secondary market. Right now they are trying to just get as many pack openings as possible by putting lottery tickets into the booster boxes, but given money is a finite resource you still cap out eventually and the randomization of the packs limits the number of mythics on the open market, even if the market needs more of one mythic than another.
Unfortunately, this strategy still doesn't solve the pre-order hype prices, but I think those are a necessary evil in this day and age.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
No, the real reason is that the CEO in charge of Pokemon simply had a better game plan than the CEO in charge of MtG. The basic fact is that if they actually did tins like they do in Pokemon we'd never see Kolitas or Gideon go over 20, let alone 15 usd, and the same can be said of Torrential Gearhulk. The problem that Wizards does not address with MtG that Hasbro does address is the extreme pressure on specific key cards needed for decks. If they handle those situations by printing tins mid standard containing boosters for the latest expansion and the key card as a promo on the front, along with digital code, it would greatly even out the prices on the secondary market. Right now they are trying to just get as many pack openings as possible by putting lottery tickets into the booster boxes, but given money is a finite resource you still cap out eventually and the randomization of the packs limits the number of mythics on the open market, even if the market needs more of one mythic than another.
Unfortunately, this strategy still doesn't solve the pre-order hype prices, but I think those are a necessary evil in this day and age.
I don't see how is that a better plan - higher prices on singles means people are more motivated to buy booster boxes and more boosters boxes being bought means more profits. Like I said, the game exists for profit and the player base of MTG is more resilient to higher prices than those in Pokemon because we already developed the "high-priced secondary market" to be the norm. You basically described the entire process that yields the greatest margin of profit, which is exactly what the shareholders want to hear from the CEO.
The "money is finite and caps out" argument just seems off to me, every for-profit's company's capping point for money is bluntly put pretty much "all the money in the world", so the finite quantity of money doesn't really matter since no company is close to that.
No, the real reason is that the CEO in charge of Pokemon simply had a better game plan than the CEO in charge of MtG. The basic fact is that if they actually did tins like they do in Pokemon we'd never see Kolitas or Gideon go over 20, let alone 15 usd, and the same can be said of Torrential Gearhulk. The problem that Wizards does not address with MtG that Hasbro does address is the extreme pressure on specific key cards needed for decks. If they handle those situations by printing tins mid standard containing boosters for the latest expansion and the key card as a promo on the front, along with digital code, it would greatly even out the prices on the secondary market. Right now they are trying to just get as many pack openings as possible by putting lottery tickets into the booster boxes, but given money is a finite resource you still cap out eventually and the randomization of the packs limits the number of mythics on the open market, even if the market needs more of one mythic than another.
Unfortunately, this strategy still doesn't solve the pre-order hype prices, but I think those are a necessary evil in this day and age.
I don't see how is that a better plan - higher prices on singles means people are more motivated to buy booster boxes and more boosters boxes being bought means more profits. Like I said, the game exists for profit and the player base of MTG is more resilient to higher prices than those in Pokemon because we already developed the "high-priced secondary market" to be the norm. You basically described the entire process that yields the greatest margin of profit, which is exactly what the shareholders want to hear from the CEO.
The "money is finite and caps out" argument just seems off to me, every for-profit's company's capping point for money is bluntly put pretty much "all the money in the world", so the finite quantity of money doesn't really matter since no company is close to that.
Box openings aren't going to slow down if Gideon, Ally of Zendikar were at 10 usd right now nor if Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet were 10 usd because those boxes are not being opened anymore. In fact, no one is opening Eldrich moon anymore either. The tins exist to get more copies of these cards into circulation during a season from older sets that are not currently being pushed and to keep card prices low enough so people can build the necessary decks. Hasbro realized this with the Pokemon TCG that this is a critical step in supporting a rotating standard and that is why they make seasonal tins that include the pokemon needed for specific archetypes along with boosters from the current standard legal sets (usually the more recent ones).
Also, with lottery ticket cards do you really think that box openings are going to drop if the mythics in the latest set were capped at 10 usd? People would be cracking these things like crazy one way or another for the same reason people play little lotto.
The trouble is that expensive cards on the secondary market are stagnant cards. Stores set the prices that high because they want to at least be able to say to a customer that they have the product they are looking for. Simply having a hot commodity item draws traffic to the store, which increases the purchasing of products at that store so store owners always try to make sure that they have a product in stock. Unfortunately, this is also why buyouts are the scrooge mcduck move of the secondary market. If a bunch of guys go and buyout a card, it puts the stores on the defensive and they have to raise prices to stop the buyout. Then the guys who did the buyout resell the cards just under the raised price to make a quick buck.
This is the part that gets kind of tricky: The promo tins can work for standard rotation, but it's a lot harder to do it for something like commander or modern. We just saw what happened when Atraxa became popular along with invent superiority. Card prices spiked across the board on cards that flew under every radar imaginable.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Every purse and wallet has a cap of how much they can or will spend. If I make 45 grand per year, I'm not spending more than that on magic unless I rack up massive credit card debt. You can't even say all the money in the world, because let's say that people cumulatively wanted to spend 1 trillion dollars on sealed product from WotC. WotC doesn't have the means to create that much supply to sell a trillion dollars worth of packs.
The only way to know whether Richard Garfield intended to make a killing profit wise off MTG is to ask him. Not everyone is in it for just money.
WotC really didn't think through their plan, they just made it up as they went along and have been doing the same thing for decades. Sell packs and now intro decks I guess. The closest thing we've gotten to tins are from the vaults, but those just get marked up a bunch due to extremely limited print run so they achieve nothing really not to mention not all the cards in them are at all desirable.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Yawgmoth," Freyalise whispered as she set the bomb, "now you will pay for your treachery."
You are simply wrong. In my lgs, people dont play standard anyway, and by packs for the thrill of it. And all editions availible in our lgs are being sold, be it the second innistrad, kahns, or conspiricy2. Sure, they are not opened by big vendors en mass, and they are no longer drafted, but a lot of casuals still buy them, and the higher the prices for those cards, the more they are willing to buy "just some more packs".
This is what I see locally as well, but I also hang out with a bunch of Table Top gamers, and we flush money down the toilet as a hobby.
Box openings aren't going to slow down if Gideon, Ally of Zendikar were at 10 usd right now nor if Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet were 10 usd because those boxes are not being opened anymore. In fact, no one is opening Eldrich moon anymore either. The tins exist to get more copies of these cards into circulation during a season from older sets that are not currently being pushed and to keep card prices low enough so people can build the necessary decks. Hasbro realized this with the Pokemon TCG that this is a critical step in supporting a rotating standard and that is why they make seasonal tins that include the pokemon needed for specific archetypes along with boosters from the current standard legal sets (usually the more recent ones).
Also, with lottery ticket cards do you really think that box openings are going to drop if the mythics in the latest set were capped at 10 usd? People would be cracking these things like crazy one way or another for the same reason people play little lotto.
The trouble is that expensive cards on the secondary market are stagnant cards. Stores set the prices that high because they want to at least be able to say to a customer that they have the product they are looking for. Simply having a hot commodity item draws traffic to the store, which increases the purchasing of products at that store so store owners always try to make sure that they have a product in stock. Unfortunately, this is also why buyouts are the scrooge mcduck move of the secondary market. If a bunch of guys go and buyout a card, it puts the stores on the defensive and they have to raise prices to stop the buyout. Then the guys who did the buyout resell the cards just under the raised price to make a quick buck.
This is the part that gets kind of tricky: The promo tins can work for standard rotation, but it's a lot harder to do it for something like commander or modern. We just saw what happened when Atraxa became popular along with invent superiority. Card prices spiked across the board on cards that flew under every radar imaginable.
Every purse and wallet has a cap of how much they can or will spend. If I make 45 grand per year, I'm not spending more than that on magic unless I rack up massive credit card debt. You can't even say all the money in the world, because let's say that people cumulatively wanted to spend 1 trillion dollars on sealed product from WotC. WotC doesn't have the means to create that much supply to sell a trillion dollars worth of packs.
The only way to know whether Richard Garfield intended to make a killing profit wise off MTG is to ask him. Not everyone is in it for just money.
WotC really didn't think through their plan, they just made it up as they went along and have been doing the same thing for decades. Sell packs and now intro decks I guess. The closest thing we've gotten to tins are from the vaults, but those just get marked up a bunch due to extremely limited print run so they achieve nothing really not to mention not all the cards in them are at all desirable.
Atraxa and Invent Superiority are pretty much the evidence why the tins wouldn't work - the "Scrooge Mcducks" you just described would still proceed to wipe them out off the market the same way they buyout a card. In fact, the tins will work worse because they contain boosters instead of of prepackaged cards.
The real unaddressed problem is WotC will not print to demand and when I say demand, it's the combined demand of the "Scrooge Mcducks" and their willingness to just keep paying so that they can "control" the market. As long as the demand is there and isn't exceeded, the "financial bubble" situation of the game as a whole will always remain there. The product doesn't matter - if WotC just printed FTVs at the same rate they printed Standard Boosters, then seeing FTVs and MSRP everywhere wouldn't be an issue, wouldn't it? If they recognized Invent Superiority's market value and announced a "Mind Seize-Style" reprint, it would solve the problem, would it not? The product doesn't matter and pretending a new tin product is going to change their mindset especially in the same era where new products just keep churning out but with the same mindset is just plain silly to me.
I get what you're trying to address, but instead of addressing the problem directly, you're pretending it's already solved by a new product entering the fray when history has already proven us wrong multiple times. There's no such thing as a product magically curing all those problems if WotC maintains the limitations of which they are printed - FTVs are the perfect example of the extreme scenario.
As a fellow consumer I can understand what you're driving at with regards to the general scenario and don't disagree with you. Problem is, MTG/WotC/Hasbro is a business and not well, politics, so the amount of people agreeing doesn't matter, the amount of money we pump is what does and those numbers we produce pale in comparison to those "Scrooge Mcducks" who aren't functionally really consumers, but more of "middleman" the same way "true stores" are as well. Also, in addition to feeding WotC more money, it's not good business to just rip out the people bearing overhead costs to keep the game running across the globe.
If Chronicles taught us anything, suggesting "the solution to the problem" together with a NEW product is pretty much the worst way of telling WotC to solve the problem, considering they got burned once.
EDIT: Just to clarify, even if a product is a "reprint" product (like Chronicles and the Masters Series), it's technically a "New Product" if it requires their traditional marketing/announcement methods and uses a drastically different name. Modern Masters was new, but Modern Masters 2, technically not considered (but that one ran into other problems although it did the improved print run correctly).
The scrooge mcducks can buy all the tins they want. The tins get printed to hell and back and distributed to big box stores as well as LGS. The reason they work is that the value in them is greater than the value of the tin itself at Distributor rates, so if someone buys them up and breaks them down they can make money by selling the contents. Even if barely any tins made it to market for consumers, the cards and packs would be resold and ultimately the cost on the card being the promo would drop. Not that anyone COULD physically buy up all the tins at the print runs those are done at. Even though they are done only one a month, the runs are fairly large in Pokemon.
It works. I mean, you can argue all day but Pokemon TCG card prices speak for themselves and the tins plus box products are the primary reason for it along with the online codes. We're talking the most expensive recently printed holofoil going for 16 usd. Our most expensive cards in standard are near 30-40 usd at their peaks. This isn't even going into the other cards. Albeit, I think it may also be the online codes and game that cut the prices down in combination with printing the needed card, but still.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The scrooge mcducks can buy all the tins they want. The tins get printed to hell and back and distributed to big box stores as well as LGS. The reason they work is that the value in them is greater than the value of the tin itself at Distributor rates, so if someone buys them up and breaks them down they can make money by selling the contents. Even if barely any tins made it to market for consumers, the cards and packs would be resold and ultimately the cost on the card being the promo would drop. Not that anyone COULD physically buy up all the tins at the print runs those are done at. Even though they are done only one a month, the runs are fairly large in Pokemon.
It works. I mean, you can argue all day but Pokemon TCG card prices speak for themselves and the tins are the primary reason for it along with the online codes. We're talking the most expensive recently printed holofoil going for 16 usd. Our most expensive cards in standard are near 30-40 usd at their peaks. This isn't even going into the other cards.
Like I said, you're pretending that WotC will print the MTG tins at the same rate as Nintendo (oh, and Pokemon isn't under Hasbro) does. The problem is that they won't. I understand you're telling me the benefits/consequences of printing to the point the "Scrooge Mcducks" are unable to buy all the tins down. I understand that works, but it will only under a product (doesn't matter if its the tin or not) that meets the printing requirements, that WotC doesn't ever seem to meet demand for any product that isn't Standard Booster Boxes.
You do realize that the "Big-Box repackages" that contain a few (usually Standard) Magic Boosters and a selected Promo already exists right (just not in a physical tin)? Why not just suggest those Standard promos be put there instead of going through the trouble of the tins?
Also, card prices don't really speak for themselves, they speak in relative to the population playing them. If there were 50,000 of that holofoil cards and 50,000 Gideons, but there are only 10,000 Pokemon players compared to 20,000 MTG players, than Gideon will still cost more than that holofoil even if they were printed at the same rates. I understand that what you're trying to say is that WotC should print another 50,000 Gideons, which I agree with, but when you solely use price to speak for themselves, pointing out there are only 10,000 Pokemon players compared to 20,000 MTG pretty much proves that the "expensive" method is correct since it yields more 10,000 more players each willing to pay more money.
The scrooge mcducks can buy all the tins they want. The tins get printed to hell and back and distributed to big box stores as well as LGS. The reason they work is that the value in them is greater than the value of the tin itself at Distributor rates, so if someone buys them up and breaks them down they can make money by selling the contents. Even if barely any tins made it to market for consumers, the cards and packs would be resold and ultimately the cost on the card being the promo would drop. Not that anyone COULD physically buy up all the tins at the print runs those are done at. Even though they are done only one a month, the runs are fairly large in Pokemon.
It works. I mean, you can argue all day but Pokemon TCG card prices speak for themselves and the tins are the primary reason for it along with the online codes. We're talking the most expensive recently printed holofoil going for 16 usd. Our most expensive cards in standard are near 30-40 usd at their peaks. This isn't even going into the other cards.
Like I said, you're pretending that WotC will print the MTG tins at the same rate as Nintendo (oh, and Pokemon isn't under Hasbro) does. The problem is that they won't. I understand you're telling me the benefits/consequences of printing to the point the "Scrooge Mcducks" are unable to buy all the tins down. I understand that works, but it will only under a product (doesn't matter if its the tin or not) that meets the printing requirements, that WotC doesn't ever seem to meet demand for any product that isn't Standard Booster Boxes.
You do realize that the "Big-Box repackages" that contain a few (usually Standard) Magic Boosters and a selected Promo already exists right (just not in a physical tin)? Why not just suggest those Standard promos be put there instead of going through the trouble of the tins?
Also, card prices don't really speak for themselves, they speak in relative to the population playing them. If there were 50,000 of that holofoil cards and 50,000 Gideons, but there are only 10,000 Pokemon players compared to 20,000 MTG players, than Gideon will still cost more than that holofoil even if they were printed at the same rates. I understand that what you're trying to say is that WotC should print another 50,000 Gideons, which I agree with, but when you solely use price to speak for themselves, pointing out there are only 10,000 Pokemon players compared to 20,000 MTG pretty much proves that the "expensive" method is correct since it yields more 10,000 more players each willing to pay more money.
Actually, now that I'm thinking on it some of those cards have full art and normal versions as well, so there's more than one printing in the same set. That can also be a reason for the prices.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
When some cards go for hundreds of dollars on the secondary market for pokemon, I would say there is a meaningful market there. Note that you don't need these super expensive rare 3 figure cards to compete in pokemon, they are merely the collectors items like 1st edition charizard from the first set.
If WotC prints enough of something, prices will drop. Tins would work the same way. ESPECIALLY when the speculators realized they could not drive up the prices via buyout and such/weren't making money the card prices would fall drastically for standard cards that appeared in tins. It isn't all that difficult to print enough that everyone has access to sub $15 standard cards for pretty much every card, ESPECIALLY considering tins are basically reprints as there are already plenty of the cards in question out there from the release of the set it was in, this just adds to that to make the cards more accessible.
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():
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"Yawgmoth," Freyalise whispered as she set the bomb, "now you will pay for your treachery."
So give me some context, when you say hundreds of dollars, I'm thinking Goyf/Lilly type value, but then you say they are not competitive cards, but collectors items.
Now, when I think 'collectors items' I think Black Lotus.
When some cards go for hundreds of dollars on the secondary market for pokemon, I would say there is a meaningful market there. Note that you don't need these super expensive rare 3 figure cards to compete in pokemon, they are merely the collectors items like 1st edition charizard from the first set.
If WotC prints enough of something, prices will drop. Tins would work the same way. ESPECIALLY when the speculators realized they could not drive up the prices via buyout and such/weren't making money the card prices would fall drastically for standard cards that appeared in tins. It isn't all that difficult to print enough that everyone has access to sub $15 standard cards for pretty much every card, ESPECIALLY considering tins are basically reprints as there are already plenty of the cards in question out there from the release of the set it was in, this just adds to that to make the cards more accessible.
This is exactly why I'm against the tin idea. If WotC prints enough of ANYTHING, prices will drop. The problem is WotC has never seem to figured this out and yet we have a plethora of supplementary products that suffer from the same problem. By recommending tins, we're encouraging WotC to churn out even more supplementary products and giving them less time to figure out what is wrong with the old/current ones and they will repeat the same mistakes simply because they don't have the time to think/review it through.
The "Staple promo to reduce Secondary Market prices" isn't a bad idea - it's the suggestion that we need to wrap a whole new shiny package around it that requires a lot more manpower than altering an already existing product that I have a problem with. WotC has plenty of products churning up resources - FNM promos that don't ever seem to be good enough, 3-pack big-box store packages that also don't seem to have good promos (and when they do it's an accident with less than a dozen running about), "premier products" that never have enough supply like FTV/Commander's Arsenal and Modern Masters 2 which was supposed to encourage drafting but for some silly reason they thought increasing MSRP would encourage people to draft.
I'm pointing we already have the "packages", all that's really left of them is to change the "quality" inside and we can achieve the same results. It sounds like I'm thinking too much for WotC's resource welfare, but the problem has dragged long enough (and the recent Standard "mistakes" don't really give me confidence they have enough resources on top of that) that we should be "recycling and improving" on old ideas instead of jumping onto new ones that would stretch resources further and make it more likely the same mistakes will happen again.
Plus, I never liked those tins as storage - as filmsy as Gift Boxes are, they still store cards better and also have 5 Standard Boosters - all we really need is to replace the promo with a better one and have it for every set instead of every block (Pokemon doesn't even do them monthly, it's quarterly like our Standard Sets) and we essentially have the same thing with a "better" box. Imagine the Kaladesh Holiday Box had Gideon instead of Chief of the Foundry, isn't that essentially the same suggestion?
The scrooge mcducks can buy all the tins they want. The tins get printed to hell and back and distributed to big box stores as well as LGS. The reason they work is that the value in them is greater than the value of the tin itself at Distributor rates, so if someone buys them up and breaks them down they can make money by selling the contents. Even if barely any tins made it to market for consumers, the cards and packs would be resold and ultimately the cost on the card being the promo would drop. Not that anyone COULD physically buy up all the tins at the print runs those are done at. Even though they are done only one a month, the runs are fairly large in Pokemon.
It works. I mean, you can argue all day but Pokemon TCG card prices speak for themselves and the tins plus box products are the primary reason for it along with the online codes. We're talking the most expensive recently printed holofoil going for 16 usd. Our most expensive cards in standard are near 30-40 usd at their peaks. This isn't even going into the other cards. Albeit, I think it may also be the online codes and game that cut the prices down in combination with printing the needed card, but still.
I have a clueword for you: Fallen Empires. You know what happend back then? Before fallen empires, the printruns were really limited. Our lgs would order like 10 cases, and would get one or two.
All that changed with fallen empire. Fallen empire was printed to the actuall demand the lgs had send in, and of course, some more to handle additional demand.
But by then, the stores were used to the "you get only a small part of what you ordered" workline, that they simply ordered several times their actual demand. And then, with fallen empires, they got all what they ordered.
I know stores, where you can, to this day, buy fallen empire packs.
So my question is that: If they print a product to the demand you suggest - everything "investors" can handle, plus the actual demand for the product from players and collectors - who will pay for it? Because you can be sure, in that case the investors will not buy at all. Since every other demand is satisfied, who pays for the additional packs the investors didn´t want. Because someone has to pay the costs for them. And if that someone is wizards, they won´t do it a second time.
Also, can you tell my what the Breed Lethality-Commander-Deck currently costs? Since Commander decks are printed to demand (at least they did this with the true-name nemesis), it should be at msrp, shoudn´t it? If it is not, how can that be?
Oh no, the commander decks are not printed to demand. They actually stopped the print run sooner on the current run than the last one so expect the prices on Atraxa to get worse. Also the reason for the prices being the way they are is that in order for any store to get more Atraxa decks, they have to order all of them. No, I'm not joking, they ship them as sets of 5 and you literally can't order just one of the five decks. That is why there is such a price descrepancy in the decks: In order to keep one deck in stock the stores have to get over stocked on the other ones.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
When some cards go for hundreds of dollars on the secondary market for pokemon, I would say there is a meaningful market there. Note that you don't need these super expensive rare 3 figure cards to compete in pokemon, they are merely the collectors items like 1st edition charizard from the first set.
If WotC prints enough of something, prices will drop. Tins would work the same way. ESPECIALLY when the speculators realized they could not drive up the prices via buyout and such/weren't making money the card prices would fall drastically for standard cards that appeared in tins. It isn't all that difficult to print enough that everyone has access to sub $15 standard cards for pretty much every card, ESPECIALLY considering tins are basically reprints as there are already plenty of the cards in question out there from the release of the set it was in, this just adds to that to make the cards more accessible.
This is exactly why I'm against the tin idea. If WotC prints enough of ANYTHING, prices will drop. The problem is WotC has never seem to figured this out and yet we have a plethora of supplementary products that suffer from the same problem. By recommending tins, we're encouraging WotC to churn out even more supplementary products and giving them less time to figure out what is wrong with the old/current ones and they will repeat the same mistakes simply because they don't have the time to think/review it through.
The "Staple promo to reduce Secondary Market prices" isn't a bad idea - it's the suggestion that we need to wrap a whole new shiny package around it that requires a lot more manpower than altering an already existing product that I have a problem with. WotC has plenty of products churning up resources - FNM promos that don't ever seem to be good enough, 3-pack big-box store packages that also don't seem to have good promos (and when they do it's an accident with less than a dozen running about), "premier products" that never have enough supply like FTV/Commander's Arsenal and Modern Masters 2 which was supposed to encourage drafting but for some silly reason they thought increasing MSRP would encourage people to draft.
I'm pointing we already have the "packages", all that's really left of them is to change the "quality" inside and we can achieve the same results. It sounds like I'm thinking too much for WotC's resource welfare, but the problem has dragged long enough (and the recent Standard "mistakes" don't really give me confidence they have enough resources on top of that) that we should be "recycling and improving" on old ideas instead of jumping onto new ones that would stretch resources further and make it more likely the same mistakes will happen again.
Plus, I never liked those tins as storage - as filmsy as Gift Boxes are, they still store cards better and also have 5 Standard Boosters - all we really need is to replace the promo with a better one and have it for every set instead of every block (Pokemon doesn't even do them monthly, it's quarterly like our Standard Sets) and we essentially have the same thing with a "better" box. Imagine the Kaladesh Holiday Box had Gideon instead of Chief of the Foundry, isn't that essentially the same suggestion?
The tins aren't supplementary products. They literally are how you get booster packs outside of boxes unless someone is buying through an online retailer who has been breaking down the tins or is selling individual packs from booster boxes. The tins are actually big box store exclusives as well (could be wrong). Also, it isn't a "tin" in the classic sense. Here is an example of what I'm talking about...
Basically, it's two boosters, a pin, and a heavily played tournament card. Wizards and hasbro has literally never done something like this. This is NOT comparable to something like the old tins of MTG like Fire and Lightning or the one with the Avatar of Woe. Also, yes Pokemon does have the "fat pack" found in Magic as well. They just call them trainer boxes...
Ultimately this is probably the future MtG is going to have one way or another, because once they integrate a good digital product demand on the physical cards will probably drop and they will need to make packs like that one to keep the card market going. Right now the only reason the market looks the way it does is because the only way to really play magic as intended is the physical game. MTGO just doesn't really cut it. Also I'm not completely sure what the future holds for LGS locations, but my assumption is once Digital next takes off there's going to be less of them.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The tins aren't supplementary products. They literally are how you get booster packs outside of boxes unless someone is buying through an online retailer who has been breaking down the tins or is selling individual packs from booster boxes. The tins are actually big box store exclusives as well (could be wrong). Also, it isn't a "tin" in the classic sense. Here is an example of what I'm talking about...
Basically, it's two boosters, a pin, and a heavily played tournament card. Wizards and hasbro has literally never done something like this. This is NOT comparable to something like the old tins of MTG like Fire and Lightning or the one with the Avatar of Woe.
Wait, you mean most stores don't sell single MTG booster packs nowadays? Pretty sure the last time I walked into a store you could still buy 4 loose booster packs without having to buy a box or a supplementary product. I also vaguely remembered seeing these "tin" products in non big box stores though (didn't pay much attention to them obviously), so I don't think they're big-box exclusives (someone with a better grasp could clarify this).
Please don't compare the "tins" to the Premium Deck Series (or the Duel Deck ones either), like you said one contains a promo, two boosters and a pin, while the other is literally an entire constructed deck. In my post you quoted I outright said the Gift Boxes are literally the same thing as the "tins", just with the "wrong promos" and "wrong frequency". Why would you compare the Pokemon "tins" with a product that's fundamentally different instead?
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Sell it for a competitive price to stores and let everyone make money again. Something like 15 - 20 dollars, US to stores. Let them either sell it sealed for 25 or 30 or let them break the product to see if they can maximise profit.
There is so much money to be had if they could do the type of sealed product that Nintendo makes.
"Sometimes, the situation is outracing a threat, sometimes it's ignoring it, and sometimes it involves sideboarding in 4x Hope//Pray." --Doug Linn
I'm talking about affordable casual product put out either monthly or bi-monthly.
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There are quarterly tins, usually a set of 2 to 4. They do contain 4 booster packs from the Standard current when they come out. Most importantly is that the promos in them are almost always $8-12 cards that are staples in a tournament archetype. That's the real purpose of the tins - the company that does Pokemon TCG uses them to keep the prices in check and help ease of access into playing the game. They also regularly put out their own version of duel decks that contain about half of the common/uncommon staples you need for any given Standard deck and always include ones that get up to the $10+ mark.
The Pokemon TCG is very very good about keeping the cost of playing the game in check. There are tons of box and promo products for casual players and Pokemon fans alike that aren't necessarily the best for getting into tournament play, but they also make sure that those wanting to get into tournament play aren't left in the dust. I decided a while ago that if I want to play a TCG competitively, it will probably be the Pokemon TCG because of how much better they are than Wizards at reprinting and keeping the secondary market in check through product. I'll always play Magic and be drafting, doing EDH and the occasional Grand Prix side events, but Pokemon has been thriving for years and is more popular than ever because of how accessible all the facets of the game are.
(Also known as Xenphire)
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
You arent going to get Liliana of the Veil, but Wizards takes a very different approach to the secondary market, and its worked for decades...
Spirits
It's definitely safe to say MTG is larger than Pokemon and as a result, has a larger, more accessible secondary market. As a result, players are more confident of buying boxes since they know that even the jank rares have a decent chance of being sold (even at a loss). When given a choice between a non-randomized product and a randomized one, the randomized one will definitely yield more money in the primary market (which is why unless you invest in thousands of a single card you don't make a lot out of the absolutely non-randomized secondary market).
Pokemon doesn't have the player base nor the market size to induce that confidence - I'm pretty sure the average "box-opening" player in MTG opens more boxes than those in Pokemon. They need to induce confidence in their game and hence these tins with playable promos help in that. While this has the benefit of helping keep prices low and affordable, I do not believe that is the primary intent of the company, only a secondary one to inducing confidence to the game itself (or more like using affordable prices to do so, but still a secondary point), that's honestly just consumer bias imagining the company places their consumers' interests in the first place (it's always second and in support to their own, no matter how marketing has you believe).
Back to MTG, one of the TCGs with the most solid player base (despite all the vocals of "I'm leaving"), they don't really have a need to reinforce confidence in their game (not until the whole recent ban-debacle, but that's another more recent issue).
Note I'm stating all this in regards to Standard. Contrary to what I said, because WotC said they don't interfere in Modern, such products will actually help out Modern a lot - the promo doesn't even have to be a rare - a promo Lightning Bolt and 4 random non-Standard Modern booster reprints for Modern (or Modern Masters if printing logistics is an issue) in a quarterly tin would be great for the format - people might be more willing to risk packs if there's a foil staple in there.
EDIT: Corrections made to errors pointed out.
No, the real reason is that the CEO in charge of Pokemon simply had a better game plan than the CEO in charge of MtG. The basic fact is that if they actually did tins like they do in Pokemon we'd never see Kolitas or Gideon go over 20, let alone 15 usd, and the same can be said of Torrential Gearhulk. The problem that Wizards does not address with MtG that Hasbro does address is the extreme pressure on specific key cards needed for decks. If they handle those situations by printing tins mid standard containing boosters for the latest expansion and the key card as a promo on the front, along with digital code, it would greatly even out the prices on the secondary market. Right now they are trying to just get as many pack openings as possible by putting lottery tickets into the booster boxes, but given money is a finite resource you still cap out eventually and the randomization of the packs limits the number of mythics on the open market, even if the market needs more of one mythic than another.
Unfortunately, this strategy still doesn't solve the pre-order hype prices, but I think those are a necessary evil in this day and age.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The game always did, and always will. Do you think Richard Garfield made it as a public service?
My mistake, and I will correct it. My point still stands though.
I don't see how is that a better plan - higher prices on singles means people are more motivated to buy booster boxes and more boosters boxes being bought means more profits. Like I said, the game exists for profit and the player base of MTG is more resilient to higher prices than those in Pokemon because we already developed the "high-priced secondary market" to be the norm. You basically described the entire process that yields the greatest margin of profit, which is exactly what the shareholders want to hear from the CEO.
The "money is finite and caps out" argument just seems off to me, every for-profit's company's capping point for money is bluntly put pretty much "all the money in the world", so the finite quantity of money doesn't really matter since no company is close to that.
Box openings aren't going to slow down if Gideon, Ally of Zendikar were at 10 usd right now nor if Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet were 10 usd because those boxes are not being opened anymore. In fact, no one is opening Eldrich moon anymore either. The tins exist to get more copies of these cards into circulation during a season from older sets that are not currently being pushed and to keep card prices low enough so people can build the necessary decks. Hasbro realized this with the Pokemon TCG that this is a critical step in supporting a rotating standard and that is why they make seasonal tins that include the pokemon needed for specific archetypes along with boosters from the current standard legal sets (usually the more recent ones).
Also, with lottery ticket cards do you really think that box openings are going to drop if the mythics in the latest set were capped at 10 usd? People would be cracking these things like crazy one way or another for the same reason people play little lotto.
The trouble is that expensive cards on the secondary market are stagnant cards. Stores set the prices that high because they want to at least be able to say to a customer that they have the product they are looking for. Simply having a hot commodity item draws traffic to the store, which increases the purchasing of products at that store so store owners always try to make sure that they have a product in stock. Unfortunately, this is also why buyouts are the scrooge mcduck move of the secondary market. If a bunch of guys go and buyout a card, it puts the stores on the defensive and they have to raise prices to stop the buyout. Then the guys who did the buyout resell the cards just under the raised price to make a quick buck.
This is the part that gets kind of tricky: The promo tins can work for standard rotation, but it's a lot harder to do it for something like commander or modern. We just saw what happened when Atraxa became popular along with invent superiority. Card prices spiked across the board on cards that flew under every radar imaginable.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The only way to know whether Richard Garfield intended to make a killing profit wise off MTG is to ask him. Not everyone is in it for just money.
WotC really didn't think through their plan, they just made it up as they went along and have been doing the same thing for decades. Sell packs and now intro decks I guess. The closest thing we've gotten to tins are from the vaults, but those just get marked up a bunch due to extremely limited print run so they achieve nothing really not to mention not all the cards in them are at all desirable.
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This is what I see locally as well, but I also hang out with a bunch of Table Top gamers, and we flush money down the toilet as a hobby.
Spirits
Atraxa and Invent Superiority are pretty much the evidence why the tins wouldn't work - the "Scrooge Mcducks" you just described would still proceed to wipe them out off the market the same way they buyout a card. In fact, the tins will work worse because they contain boosters instead of of prepackaged cards.
The real unaddressed problem is WotC will not print to demand and when I say demand, it's the combined demand of the "Scrooge Mcducks" and their willingness to just keep paying so that they can "control" the market. As long as the demand is there and isn't exceeded, the "financial bubble" situation of the game as a whole will always remain there. The product doesn't matter - if WotC just printed FTVs at the same rate they printed Standard Boosters, then seeing FTVs and MSRP everywhere wouldn't be an issue, wouldn't it? If they recognized Invent Superiority's market value and announced a "Mind Seize-Style" reprint, it would solve the problem, would it not? The product doesn't matter and pretending a new tin product is going to change their mindset especially in the same era where new products just keep churning out but with the same mindset is just plain silly to me.
I get what you're trying to address, but instead of addressing the problem directly, you're pretending it's already solved by a new product entering the fray when history has already proven us wrong multiple times. There's no such thing as a product magically curing all those problems if WotC maintains the limitations of which they are printed - FTVs are the perfect example of the extreme scenario.
As a fellow consumer I can understand what you're driving at with regards to the general scenario and don't disagree with you. Problem is, MTG/WotC/Hasbro is a business and not well, politics, so the amount of people agreeing doesn't matter, the amount of money we pump is what does and those numbers we produce pale in comparison to those "Scrooge Mcducks" who aren't functionally really consumers, but more of "middleman" the same way "true stores" are as well. Also, in addition to feeding WotC more money, it's not good business to just rip out the people bearing overhead costs to keep the game running across the globe.
If Chronicles taught us anything, suggesting "the solution to the problem" together with a NEW product is pretty much the worst way of telling WotC to solve the problem, considering they got burned once.
EDIT: Just to clarify, even if a product is a "reprint" product (like Chronicles and the Masters Series), it's technically a "New Product" if it requires their traditional marketing/announcement methods and uses a drastically different name. Modern Masters was new, but Modern Masters 2, technically not considered (but that one ran into other problems although it did the improved print run correctly).
It works. I mean, you can argue all day but Pokemon TCG card prices speak for themselves and the tins plus box products are the primary reason for it along with the online codes. We're talking the most expensive recently printed holofoil going for 16 usd. Our most expensive cards in standard are near 30-40 usd at their peaks. This isn't even going into the other cards. Albeit, I think it may also be the online codes and game that cut the prices down in combination with printing the needed card, but still.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Like I said, you're pretending that WotC will print the MTG tins at the same rate as Nintendo (oh, and Pokemon isn't under Hasbro) does. The problem is that they won't. I understand you're telling me the benefits/consequences of printing to the point the "Scrooge Mcducks" are unable to buy all the tins down. I understand that works, but it will only under a product (doesn't matter if its the tin or not) that meets the printing requirements, that WotC doesn't ever seem to meet demand for any product that isn't Standard Booster Boxes.
You do realize that the "Big-Box repackages" that contain a few (usually Standard) Magic Boosters and a selected Promo already exists right (just not in a physical tin)? Why not just suggest those Standard promos be put there instead of going through the trouble of the tins?
Also, card prices don't really speak for themselves, they speak in relative to the population playing them. If there were 50,000 of that holofoil cards and 50,000 Gideons, but there are only 10,000 Pokemon players compared to 20,000 MTG players, than Gideon will still cost more than that holofoil even if they were printed at the same rates. I understand that what you're trying to say is that WotC should print another 50,000 Gideons, which I agree with, but when you solely use price to speak for themselves, pointing out there are only 10,000 Pokemon players compared to 20,000 MTG pretty much proves that the "expensive" method is correct since it yields more 10,000 more players each willing to pay more money.
Actually, now that I'm thinking on it some of those cards have full art and normal versions as well, so there's more than one printing in the same set. That can also be a reason for the prices.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Is there a meaningful secondary market for Pokemon??
Spirits
If WotC prints enough of something, prices will drop. Tins would work the same way. ESPECIALLY when the speculators realized they could not drive up the prices via buyout and such/weren't making money the card prices would fall drastically for standard cards that appeared in tins. It isn't all that difficult to print enough that everyone has access to sub $15 standard cards for pretty much every card, ESPECIALLY considering tins are basically reprints as there are already plenty of the cards in question out there from the release of the set it was in, this just adds to that to make the cards more accessible.
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Now, when I think 'collectors items' I think Black Lotus.
http://www.ebay.ca/itm/MTG-MAGIC-THE-GATHERING-BETA-BLACK-LOTUS-BGS-10-THE-HIGHEST-GRADED-/310327005845
So give me some context here.
Spirits
This is exactly why I'm against the tin idea. If WotC prints enough of ANYTHING, prices will drop. The problem is WotC has never seem to figured this out and yet we have a plethora of supplementary products that suffer from the same problem. By recommending tins, we're encouraging WotC to churn out even more supplementary products and giving them less time to figure out what is wrong with the old/current ones and they will repeat the same mistakes simply because they don't have the time to think/review it through.
The "Staple promo to reduce Secondary Market prices" isn't a bad idea - it's the suggestion that we need to wrap a whole new shiny package around it that requires a lot more manpower than altering an already existing product that I have a problem with. WotC has plenty of products churning up resources - FNM promos that don't ever seem to be good enough, 3-pack big-box store packages that also don't seem to have good promos (and when they do it's an accident with less than a dozen running about), "premier products" that never have enough supply like FTV/Commander's Arsenal and Modern Masters 2 which was supposed to encourage drafting but for some silly reason they thought increasing MSRP would encourage people to draft.
I'm pointing we already have the "packages", all that's really left of them is to change the "quality" inside and we can achieve the same results. It sounds like I'm thinking too much for WotC's resource welfare, but the problem has dragged long enough (and the recent Standard "mistakes" don't really give me confidence they have enough resources on top of that) that we should be "recycling and improving" on old ideas instead of jumping onto new ones that would stretch resources further and make it more likely the same mistakes will happen again.
Plus, I never liked those tins as storage - as filmsy as Gift Boxes are, they still store cards better and also have 5 Standard Boosters - all we really need is to replace the promo with a better one and have it for every set instead of every block (Pokemon doesn't even do them monthly, it's quarterly like our Standard Sets) and we essentially have the same thing with a "better" box. Imagine the Kaladesh Holiday Box had Gideon instead of Chief of the Foundry, isn't that essentially the same suggestion?
Oh no, the commander decks are not printed to demand. They actually stopped the print run sooner on the current run than the last one so expect the prices on Atraxa to get worse. Also the reason for the prices being the way they are is that in order for any store to get more Atraxa decks, they have to order all of them. No, I'm not joking, they ship them as sets of 5 and you literally can't order just one of the five decks. That is why there is such a price descrepancy in the decks: In order to keep one deck in stock the stores have to get over stocked on the other ones.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The tins aren't supplementary products. They literally are how you get booster packs outside of boxes unless someone is buying through an online retailer who has been breaking down the tins or is selling individual packs from booster boxes. The tins are actually big box store exclusives as well (could be wrong). Also, it isn't a "tin" in the classic sense. Here is an example of what I'm talking about...
Mythical Collection Darkrai
Basically, it's two boosters, a pin, and a heavily played tournament card. Wizards and hasbro has literally never done something like this. This is NOT comparable to something like the old tins of MTG like Fire and Lightning or the one with the Avatar of Woe. Also, yes Pokemon does have the "fat pack" found in Magic as well. They just call them trainer boxes...
Trainer Box
Ultimately this is probably the future MtG is going to have one way or another, because once they integrate a good digital product demand on the physical cards will probably drop and they will need to make packs like that one to keep the card market going. Right now the only reason the market looks the way it does is because the only way to really play magic as intended is the physical game. MTGO just doesn't really cut it. Also I'm not completely sure what the future holds for LGS locations, but my assumption is once Digital next takes off there's going to be less of them.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Wait, you mean most stores don't sell single MTG booster packs nowadays? Pretty sure the last time I walked into a store you could still buy 4 loose booster packs without having to buy a box or a supplementary product. I also vaguely remembered seeing these "tin" products in non big box stores though (didn't pay much attention to them obviously), so I don't think they're big-box exclusives (someone with a better grasp could clarify this).
Please don't compare the "tins" to the Premium Deck Series (or the Duel Deck ones either), like you said one contains a promo, two boosters and a pin, while the other is literally an entire constructed deck. In my post you quoted I outright said the Gift Boxes are literally the same thing as the "tins", just with the "wrong promos" and "wrong frequency". Why would you compare the Pokemon "tins" with a product that's fundamentally different instead?