Masterpieces and double Heart of Kirans notwithstanding (as they should be) even if your box is completely perfect you're still going to fall below 100$.
There's no set contents intended for legacy, modern, commander, pauper, vintage, or any other format aside from Standard, so you're essentially voting with your wallet and saying "forget the rest of the game, I don't want anything but Standard content!"
And the hottest card in the set, which you have a 1 in 51,840 chance of opening, is an alt-art Chalice of the Void at 100$ - AKA breaking even
Compare with KTK - fetches were good for everyone, there was popular new commanders for EDH, pauper got some good tribal support, the chase cards were just regular rares in foil, Ascendancys became total staples, cards like Treasure Cruise were COMMON, we got wedge tris - it's only been a few years since Khans and the quality has slipped depressingly low.
If people keep buying sets like this then nothing's going to change, so I honestly feel like I'm missing something. What's the appeal of AER?
So yes, there are actually a lot of Modern playable cards in this set. While most Modern players may not buy boosters directly, I'm sure they are grateful for the draft/Standard players who do that and sell the choice bits to them.
There's no set contents intended for legacy, modern, commander, pauper, vintage, or any other format aside from Standard
I'm an EDH guy and AER has been wonderful. There's a ton of amazing utility in the set, not just at rare/mythic level. My usual prerelease wantlist for a set is about 2-3 cards tops, this one had over 20.
That said, I have no idea why the EV of this thing is so low. Maybe the masterpieces are screwing with it?
Sounds like someone watched the most recent TCC video.
As a Commander only player myself, I have already slotted a few cards from Aether Revolt into decks. Disallow just goes in blue decks, as all those modes are things you want. Whir of Invention is cool in artifact decks that get a bunch of guys out, like Breya. My LGS was out of Herald of Anguish or I would have gotten one for my Lyzolda deck. Lightning Runner is the only creature that comes with double strike and haste, two abilities my equipment based mono-red deck wants. Ajani Unyielding is getting jammed into my green white control deck as soon as I find room.
There are lots of other cards that have piqued my interest as a Commander only player, and as time goes on I am sure I will find more cards that I want to run. "Intended for Commander" is such a strange phrase, because it seems to imply that Commander players only want dumb 10+ cmc spells, which is not our only interest. But on that note, are you trying to imply that Planar Bridge was intended for any format other than Commander? What about Paradox Engine? Indomitable Creativity? Mechanized Production? These cards seem like they were obviously aimed at players who want big, splashy cards, which is what most people seem to think Commander players want.
There is tons in this set for people in every format, you just gotta look. As for the value of the cards, of course values will be down. Wizards is still including lottery tickets in every pack, so people are going to open the hell out of packs looking for them, meaning more product than normal is being opened, so cards will be readily available. Things that do not have obvious standard applications will naturally be cheaper.
That said, I have no idea why the EV of this thing is so low. Maybe the masterpieces are screwing with it?
This is a highly probable hypothesis. Lots of vendors want masterpieces to sell, so they're ripping open more boxes than sets without these special expiditions/masterpieces/whatever which floods the market with all the other cards of the set, and they have to get rid of them. Supply outstretches demand for them, so the price is depressed.
If places like StarCity Games didn't rip open crates at a time looking for masterpieces, some of the other cards might be worth more.
In response to why buying Aether Revolt? It's because I'm using the cards for Modern. Spire of Industry, Narnam Renegade, Hidden Herbalists have been fun and useful.
There's no set contents intended for legacy, modern, commander, pauper, vintage, or any other format aside from Standard
I'm an EDH guy and AER has been wonderful. There's a ton of amazing utility in the set, not just at rare/mythic level. My usual prerelease wantlist for a set is about 2-3 cards tops, this one had over 20.
Yeah, ditto. There's plenty of AER cards I want for Commander, and not just for my Depala deck.
That said, I have no idea why the EV of this thing is so low. Maybe the masterpieces are screwing with it?
One of the primary reasons for the inventions/expeditions is to entice people to open more sealed product, generating higher supply on the singles market, driving prices down. So, in an indirect way, driving down the EV of the set is why the inventions are there in the first place.
The EV of a box should remain close to the cost of a box. If the EV is lower, people largely stop buying boxes, and if it's higher, people buy more, until it stabilizes.
Inventions should not impact the EV of a box, as the EV is just the mean value. What they can and do impact, however, is the median value of a pack. If the EV of a set without Masterpieces is $100/box, that means the EV of a pack is $2.78. But if we add in Masterpieces with a mean value of $100 in 1:4 boxes, the EV of those boxes should remain still at $100 each, so the value of a Masterpiece-less box would be $75 and a box with a Masterpiece closer to $175. This means that for three boxes, your pack EV is $2.08 instead of $2.78.
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The EV of a box should remain close to the cost of a box. If the EV is lower, people largely stop buying boxes, and if it's higher, people buy more, until it stabilizes.
Inventions should not impact the EV of a box, as the EV is just the mean value. What they can and do impact, however, is the median value of a pack. If the EV of a set without Masterpieces is $100/box, that means the EV of a pack is $2.78. But if we add in Masterpieces with a mean value of $100 in 1:4 boxes, the EV of those boxes should remain still at $100 each, so the value of a Masterpiece-less box would be $75 and a box with a Masterpiece closer to $175. This means that for three boxes, your pack EV is $2.08 instead of $2.78.
This is pretty dead on. Come to think of it, the masterpieces were actually brilliant in a weird, warped way - wizards flip more product, the average player gets cheaper singles at retailers, retailers get to flip both the set singles and the inventions, and collectors get fancy pretty foils. The average players just need to stop trying to rip packs for value, I guess.
This is pretty dead on. Come to think of it, the masterpieces were actually brilliant in a weird, warped way - wizards flip more product, the average player gets cheaper singles at retailers, retailers get to flip both the set singles and the inventions, and collectors get fancy pretty foils. The average players just need to stop trying to rip packs for value, I guess.
I'm opposed to it for the same reason I was opposed to the Mythic Rarity: it tanks the value of an "average" pack by shifting more of a box's value to a smaller subset of packs. Back before Mythics were printed, more rares in a set were worth above a pack value, because SOMETHING had to be. In general, more stuff fell in the $2-6 range. Mythics made it so the majority of rares are worth <$2 while most Mythics are worth a lot more, making 7:8 packs more or less worthless. Masterpieces further this effect, making 3:4 BOXES worth less. It increasingly turns packs and even boxes into lottery tickets, which increases the payoff of the "Winning" packs, making people feel good enough to keep going back, while making most packs worthless or near-worthless.
But it seems that's the direction the game is going. I'm probably going to keep buying sealed product as I like to support my LGS (and they can get me sweet German boxes at a reasonable price), but I'm sure going to gripe about it online more than I used to.
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It's a fun set. I've enjoyed it in limited and casual, and there are a lot of cards for my cube in it. Not everybody is obsessed with current values. Those values don't hold anyway; They only matter while in standard. Heart of Kiran will be worth 5$ tops when it rotates, and that's no secret. Standard legal prices are artificially inflated, and don't even reflect the eventual value of a card. Something like Paradox Engine is basically guaranteed to rise in value post-rotation, whereas something like Heart of Kiran can do naught but plummet. The only reasons to pay attention to these prices are (A) you are buying into standard, or (B) you are trying to get cash value out of cards that you open.
The only reasons to pay attention to these prices are (A) you are buying into standard, or (B) you are trying to get cash value out of cards that you open.
Well, or if you're trying to respect your money or spend wisely or support products that provide benefit to the game they represent. The game isn't healthy if only Standard is healthy!
Well, or if you're trying to respect your money or spend wisely or support products that provide benefit to the game they represent. The game isn't healthy if only Standard is healthy!
If what you care about is formats other than Standard, don't look at a set that was just released: those values reflect Standard almost exclusively. Aether Revolt's impact hasn't had time to settle in the larger game. The fact is that most sets are comprised almost entirely of cards that have little impact on the larger game. Aether Revolt doesn't seem weaker on that count than most small sets to me. If it does to you, I'd like to understand why, but if that's entirely based on current value, it isn't a very strong argument. It seems to me like there are a lot of potential goodies going to a lot of formats. I would have said that Aether Revolt was above average on that count, so it's strange to see this argument.
I'm not a willing capitalist, so I guess I don't respect my money, or anyone's really. The capitalism of this game is my least favorite element of it. I play magic for joy, and I purchase Magic cards for joy. If you are opening any sealed product for value, you are a fool, just like you are a fool if you go to a casino to make money. Once again, prices during standard legality are not useful indicators of actual value. If you are looking for cards with actual value, you should order specific ones based on their utility, and not their current price. Aether Revolt has loads of cards with a decent chance to appreciate, especially at common and uncommon, making it actually a safer long term investment than usual to open sealed product, although once again this is never, and will never be a safe investment. Gods, I hate capitalism.
If you really wanna be a capitalist, and make money off of other people's enjoyment of the game, the way is simple. While a set is being mass opened, acquire dozens of copies of cards that are worth next to nothing, but have long-term casual appeal, like Efficient Construction, and Scrap Trawler. Mark my words, both of those cards will be worth considerably more in ten years, even if it's only a few bucks. The hype train is never the place to go. Heart of Kiran is a false dream, and will never be worth a shadow of what it is now.
1) It's the newest current standard released set, so people are going to draft it for the new factor.
2) Aether Revolt has quite a few popular cards even if the monetary value doesn't reflect it on the secondary market. Also, the secondary market is a horrible thing to use to judge how powerful or good a card is. The one thing that makes the secondary market expensive for standard is follow the leader mentality and a lack of people interested in brewing.
3) Most sealed players don't really care about the monetary value. They go to the store and pay 20 or 30 bucks to draft or do a limited game and go home in the evening, often trading the cards back in for the next time they come in to play. That, in my mind, is the right decision to make when buying sealed packs.
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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!
Same people who buy a single lottery ticket, are the ones buying single booster packs. They know the odds are wet garbage...but there's still a chance to pull a shiny masterpiece.
WOTC literally has to pander to the same gambling instincts and addictions found in the scratch card lottery to get there packs to move....
Same people who buy a single lottery ticket, are the ones buying single booster packs. They know the odds are wet garbage...but there's still a chance to pull a shiny masterpiece.
WOTC literally has to pander to the same gambling instincts and addictions found in the scratch card lottery to get there packs to move....
Guys, not everything is about literal cash value. When I buy a pack, it's certainly not out of hope to pull a masterpiece, those were just invented, and I don't even consider that when choosing which set to buy (odds are too low to matter). I actually enjoy the art of design that goes into magic, and choose based on the overall quality of the set (which doesn't usually line up with cash value). I want to have, and play with the cards, and I have no plans to ever sell them, so it doesn't really matter what they are technically worth. True, I'm a casual player and a cube brewer, not a competitive player, but I'm not the only one looking at the game from the perspective of fun over investment. If you're into safe investments, it's not a secret that sealed product is not for you.
Same people who buy a single lottery ticket, are the ones buying single booster packs. They know the odds are wet garbage...but there's still a chance to pull a shiny masterpiece.
WOTC literally has to pander to the same gambling instincts and addictions found in the scratch card lottery to get there packs to move....
You're acting like gambling instincts and the TCG business model are new bedfellows. They're not. The rush of maybe getting lucky lies at the core of how TCGs make money, and it always has. I'm willing to admit that I enjoy that kind of rush, which is part of the reason I play limited, and, for people who don't, there's the singles market and LCGs.
Masterpieces and double Heart of Kirans notwithstanding (as they should be) even if your box is completely perfect you're still going to fall below 100$.
There's no set contents intended for legacy, modern, commander, pauper, vintage, or any other format aside from Standard, so you're essentially voting with your wallet and saying "forget the rest of the game, I don't want anything but Standard content!"
And the hottest card in the set, which you have a 1 in 51,840 chance of opening, is an alt-art Chalice of the Void at 100$ - AKA breaking even
Compare with KTK - fetches were good for everyone, there was popular new commanders for EDH, pauper got some good tribal support, the chase cards were just regular rares in foil, Ascendancys became total staples, cards like Treasure Cruise were COMMON, we got wedge tris - it's only been a few years since Khans and the quality has slipped depressingly low.
If people keep buying sets like this then nothing's going to change, so I honestly feel like I'm missing something. What's the appeal of AER?
Because that's how a capitalist society operates. Let people buy whatever the hell they want if it makes them happy.
But frankly, most sets are pretty bad, Aether Revolt is especially bad if you are looking at value, as theres just so much trash thats worth nothing.
Fatal Push is worth more than almost any rare and lots of mythics.
In a display, you will end up with 1~3 Fatal Push, which is hardly anything.
Even if you get a display at ~80$ you have a hard time getting the value out of it, even with a masterpiece you might fail to get the value, which is brutal.
----
So yes, its a terrible set to buy, but theres still people that wont care and if you are lucky enough it probably doesnt matter anyway.
The only sets that are remotely worth buying are the ones that include some really good cycle of rares, like the fetchlands, so your chances of hitting something that is worth 3+ boosters is at least remotely real.
Another cool feature was the possible extra rare in the form of double sided cards in Innistrad, which also upped the value of the set as your "minimal" gain was higher (and your potential maximum too).
Historically the smaller sets have always been a bit of a problem, though. It's just interesting that this is probably the first one in the new two set block format to really feel like Dragons Maze. The set is fun to play and outside of Revolt the mechanics are fairly interesting as well with energy being a big one. Kaladesh just feels like it is going to be a black sheep block much like Kamigawa was.
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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!
Same people who buy a single lottery ticket, are the ones buying single booster packs. They know the odds are wet garbage...but there's still a chance to pull a shiny masterpiece.
WOTC literally has to pander to the same gambling instincts and addictions found in the scratch card lottery to get there packs to move....
You're acting like gambling instincts and the TCG business model are new bedfellows. They're not. The rush of maybe getting lucky lies at the core of how TCGs make money, and it always has. I'm willing to admit that I enjoy that kind of rush, which is part of the reason I play limited, and, for people who don't, there's the singles market and LCGs.
Yes, there has always been a gambling aspect in MTG, but WOTC has ramped it up more and more. First with the addition of 'mythics' and now with special lottery cards like the Zendikar Lands, and the Masterpieces. They're becoming less dependent on making a good sustainable product, and more dependent on triggering deep rooted gambling problems.
There's no set contents intended for legacy, modern, commander, pauper, vintage, or any other format aside from Standard, so you're essentially voting with your wallet and saying "forget the rest of the game, I don't want anything but Standard content!"
And the hottest card in the set, which you have a 1 in 51,840 chance of opening, is an alt-art Chalice of the Void at 100$ - AKA breaking even
Compare with KTK - fetches were good for everyone, there was popular new commanders for EDH, pauper got some good tribal support, the chase cards were just regular rares in foil, Ascendancys became total staples, cards like Treasure Cruise were COMMON, we got wedge tris - it's only been a few years since Khans and the quality has slipped depressingly low.
If people keep buying sets like this then nothing's going to change, so I honestly feel like I'm missing something. What's the appeal of AER?
Fatal Push is playable, and it's the best black removal spell. Baral, Chief of Compliance and Sram, Senior Edificer go into two separate combo decks that are capable of killing on turn 2 or 3. Renegade Rallier enables a new infinite combo in Abzan Company with Saffi Eriksdotter, and it's a good value card even if you don't have Saffi yet. Walking Ballista goes into Eldrazi Tron. Affinity and Lantern players are teching Spire of Industry in place of or in addition to Glimmervoid. Negate and Ornithopter are reprints of already playable cards.
There are plenty of cards for lower tier decks too. Narnam Renegade and Hidden Herbalists are playable in Bushwhacker Zoo. Kari Zev's Expertise goes into random combo decks with cards like Beck // Call, Breaking // Entering and Living End. Felidar Guardian + Saheeli Rai is capable of 5-0ing Leagues and T32ing a GP. Winding Constrictor acts as Hardened Scales 5-8 in a brew featuring "modular" artifact creatures (Arcbound Ravager, Hangarback Walker, Walking Ballista).
So yes, there are actually a lot of Modern playable cards in this set. While most Modern players may not buy boosters directly, I'm sure they are grateful for the draft/Standard players who do that and sell the choice bits to them.
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I'm an EDH guy and AER has been wonderful. There's a ton of amazing utility in the set, not just at rare/mythic level. My usual prerelease wantlist for a set is about 2-3 cards tops, this one had over 20.
That said, I have no idea why the EV of this thing is so low. Maybe the masterpieces are screwing with it?
As a Commander only player myself, I have already slotted a few cards from Aether Revolt into decks. Disallow just goes in blue decks, as all those modes are things you want. Whir of Invention is cool in artifact decks that get a bunch of guys out, like Breya. My LGS was out of Herald of Anguish or I would have gotten one for my Lyzolda deck. Lightning Runner is the only creature that comes with double strike and haste, two abilities my equipment based mono-red deck wants. Ajani Unyielding is getting jammed into my green white control deck as soon as I find room.
There are lots of other cards that have piqued my interest as a Commander only player, and as time goes on I am sure I will find more cards that I want to run. "Intended for Commander" is such a strange phrase, because it seems to imply that Commander players only want dumb 10+ cmc spells, which is not our only interest. But on that note, are you trying to imply that Planar Bridge was intended for any format other than Commander? What about Paradox Engine? Indomitable Creativity? Mechanized Production? These cards seem like they were obviously aimed at players who want big, splashy cards, which is what most people seem to think Commander players want.
There is tons in this set for people in every format, you just gotta look. As for the value of the cards, of course values will be down. Wizards is still including lottery tickets in every pack, so people are going to open the hell out of packs looking for them, meaning more product than normal is being opened, so cards will be readily available. Things that do not have obvious standard applications will naturally be cheaper.
This is a highly probable hypothesis. Lots of vendors want masterpieces to sell, so they're ripping open more boxes than sets without these special expiditions/masterpieces/whatever which floods the market with all the other cards of the set, and they have to get rid of them. Supply outstretches demand for them, so the price is depressed.
If places like StarCity Games didn't rip open crates at a time looking for masterpieces, some of the other cards might be worth more.
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One of the primary reasons for the inventions/expeditions is to entice people to open more sealed product, generating higher supply on the singles market, driving prices down. So, in an indirect way, driving down the EV of the set is why the inventions are there in the first place.
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Inventions should not impact the EV of a box, as the EV is just the mean value. What they can and do impact, however, is the median value of a pack. If the EV of a set without Masterpieces is $100/box, that means the EV of a pack is $2.78. But if we add in Masterpieces with a mean value of $100 in 1:4 boxes, the EV of those boxes should remain still at $100 each, so the value of a Masterpiece-less box would be $75 and a box with a Masterpiece closer to $175. This means that for three boxes, your pack EV is $2.08 instead of $2.78.
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This is pretty dead on. Come to think of it, the masterpieces were actually brilliant in a weird, warped way - wizards flip more product, the average player gets cheaper singles at retailers, retailers get to flip both the set singles and the inventions, and collectors get fancy pretty foils. The average players just need to stop trying to rip packs for value, I guess.
I'm opposed to it for the same reason I was opposed to the Mythic Rarity: it tanks the value of an "average" pack by shifting more of a box's value to a smaller subset of packs. Back before Mythics were printed, more rares in a set were worth above a pack value, because SOMETHING had to be. In general, more stuff fell in the $2-6 range. Mythics made it so the majority of rares are worth <$2 while most Mythics are worth a lot more, making 7:8 packs more or less worthless. Masterpieces further this effect, making 3:4 BOXES worth less. It increasingly turns packs and even boxes into lottery tickets, which increases the payoff of the "Winning" packs, making people feel good enough to keep going back, while making most packs worthless or near-worthless.
But it seems that's the direction the game is going. I'm probably going to keep buying sealed product as I like to support my LGS (and they can get me sweet German boxes at a reasonable price), but I'm sure going to gripe about it online more than I used to.
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Aether Revolt is a pretty well designed set, and part of that is its lack of overtly overpowered cards like Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet (which are both poor designs) in favor of more subtle power (like Sram, Senior Edificer, which is good design).
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Well, or if you're trying to respect your money or spend wisely or support products that provide benefit to the game they represent. The game isn't healthy if only Standard is healthy!
If what you care about is formats other than Standard, don't look at a set that was just released: those values reflect Standard almost exclusively. Aether Revolt's impact hasn't had time to settle in the larger game. The fact is that most sets are comprised almost entirely of cards that have little impact on the larger game. Aether Revolt doesn't seem weaker on that count than most small sets to me. If it does to you, I'd like to understand why, but if that's entirely based on current value, it isn't a very strong argument. It seems to me like there are a lot of potential goodies going to a lot of formats. I would have said that Aether Revolt was above average on that count, so it's strange to see this argument.
I'm not a willing capitalist, so I guess I don't respect my money, or anyone's really. The capitalism of this game is my least favorite element of it. I play magic for joy, and I purchase Magic cards for joy. If you are opening any sealed product for value, you are a fool, just like you are a fool if you go to a casino to make money. Once again, prices during standard legality are not useful indicators of actual value. If you are looking for cards with actual value, you should order specific ones based on their utility, and not their current price. Aether Revolt has loads of cards with a decent chance to appreciate, especially at common and uncommon, making it actually a safer long term investment than usual to open sealed product, although once again this is never, and will never be a safe investment. Gods, I hate capitalism.
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1) It's the newest current standard released set, so people are going to draft it for the new factor.
2) Aether Revolt has quite a few popular cards even if the monetary value doesn't reflect it on the secondary market. Also, the secondary market is a horrible thing to use to judge how powerful or good a card is. The one thing that makes the secondary market expensive for standard is follow the leader mentality and a lack of people interested in brewing.
3) Most sealed players don't really care about the monetary value. They go to the store and pay 20 or 30 bucks to draft or do a limited game and go home in the evening, often trading the cards back in for the next time they come in to play. That, in my mind, is the right decision to make when buying sealed packs.
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!
There are way too many examples to accept that price = power. It doesnt.
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BG(B/G)Not Another Meren DeckFoil
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UB(U/B)Dragonlord Silumgar
WOTC literally has to pander to the same gambling instincts and addictions found in the scratch card lottery to get there packs to move....
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"
Guys, not everything is about literal cash value. When I buy a pack, it's certainly not out of hope to pull a masterpiece, those were just invented, and I don't even consider that when choosing which set to buy (odds are too low to matter). I actually enjoy the art of design that goes into magic, and choose based on the overall quality of the set (which doesn't usually line up with cash value). I want to have, and play with the cards, and I have no plans to ever sell them, so it doesn't really matter what they are technically worth. True, I'm a casual player and a cube brewer, not a competitive player, but I'm not the only one looking at the game from the perspective of fun over investment. If you're into safe investments, it's not a secret that sealed product is not for you.
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My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
You're acting like gambling instincts and the TCG business model are new bedfellows. They're not. The rush of maybe getting lucky lies at the core of how TCGs make money, and it always has. I'm willing to admit that I enjoy that kind of rush, which is part of the reason I play limited, and, for people who don't, there's the singles market and LCGs.
Because that's how a capitalist society operates. Let people buy whatever the hell they want if it makes them happy.
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But frankly, most sets are pretty bad, Aether Revolt is especially bad if you are looking at value, as theres just so much trash thats worth nothing.
Fatal Push is worth more than almost any rare and lots of mythics.
In a display, you will end up with 1~3 Fatal Push, which is hardly anything.
Even if you get a display at ~80$ you have a hard time getting the value out of it, even with a masterpiece you might fail to get the value, which is brutal.
----
So yes, its a terrible set to buy, but theres still people that wont care and if you are lucky enough it probably doesnt matter anyway.
The only sets that are remotely worth buying are the ones that include some really good cycle of rares, like the fetchlands, so your chances of hitting something that is worth 3+ boosters is at least remotely real.
Another cool feature was the possible extra rare in the form of double sided cards in Innistrad, which also upped the value of the set as your "minimal" gain was higher (and your potential maximum too).
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WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
👮👮👮 #BlueLivesMatter 👮👮👮
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!
Yes, there has always been a gambling aspect in MTG, but WOTC has ramped it up more and more. First with the addition of 'mythics' and now with special lottery cards like the Zendikar Lands, and the Masterpieces. They're becoming less dependent on making a good sustainable product, and more dependent on triggering deep rooted gambling problems.
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"