LGS gets most of it's single supply from players. Players trading in their draft materials, players trading decks, players cashing out. Yes it all originally comes from wizards but players buying singles aren't loyal customers of wizards, the shops they support might be but it's not the same thing. If Hour of Devestation turns this into the greatest standard season ever because of cards in Kaladesh wizards doesn't make more money. Kaladesh is out of print, only the store makes more money (and maybe the distributor who overbought)
Players are not laying booster packs like chickens... booster packs come from somewhere...
In the long run, wizards is not loosing money. How the players get the card and how the second market gets the cards do reflect to the cost of the singles, but all cards start from one source (Wizards).
So far I'm not sure what this tread is about... The only thing comes to my mind is 'there is nothing wrong with magic' but 'there is something seriously wrong some players and their views of the Collectible Card Game'
My take of the game is 50% hobby, 25% casual (EDH and Multi-player decks) and 25% tournament (Legacy/Frontier). I do have a couple decks focused on tournaments but it's not the core of my interest with the game, but they don't have proxies. I have a few EDH decks pimped out (My Relentless Rats deck has a beta Demonic Tutor and a beta Sol Ring a foil necro and some other cards... When I play the deck it feels like I'm showing off my collection - but it's an awesome feeling As for a Hobby I try to keep myself informed with all the latest tricks/strategies and I do buy singes that I do think are good deals.
Wouldn't an LGS box mapping and weighing packs be a form of market manipulation? You're intentionally lowering the... what's the term? ECV? Of individual packs by removing most, if not all, of the high ticket cards. Thereby artificially increasing your returns by sell8ng foils and mapped cards at a premium then selling jank packs at a premium.
I see a ton of eBay auctions for 1/2 the packs out of a box. It would be brain dead to assume they haven't been weighed and picked through.
I would consider that to be selling fraudulent product.
IANAL, but I'm pretty certain you're wrong on that, at least as far as the law is concerned. You are still purchasing packs of $set, and that's all the store is advertising to you. That the packs may not contain the cards you want is kind of irrelevant. The store didn't say "buy a pack, get a Liliana!", they said "buy a pack!"
I whole heartedly agree, and feel WotC should take measures to reduce that. But that wasn't the point of my post.
Wizards has taken steps to prevent box mapping, several times over the years. At this point it's nearly impossible to map a new set. Plus, it was never possible to map foils.
Wouldn't an LGS box mapping and weighing packs be a form of market manipulation? You're intentionally lowering the... what's the term? ECV? Of individual packs by removing most, if not all, of the high ticket cards. Thereby artificially increasing your returns by sell8ng foils and mapped cards at a premium then selling jank packs at a premium.
I see a ton of eBay auctions for 1/2 the packs out of a box. It would be brain dead to assume they haven't been weighed and picked through.
I would consider that to be selling fraudulent product.
IANAL, but I'm pretty certain you're wrong on that, at least as far as the law is concerned. You are still purchasing packs of $set, and that's all the store is advertising to you. That the packs may not contain the cards you want is kind of irrelevant. The store didn't say "buy a pack, get a Liliana!", they said "buy a pack!"
I whole heartedly agree, and feel WotC should take measures to reduce that. But that wasn't the point of my post.
Wizards has taken steps to prevent box mapping, several times over the years. At this point it's nearly impossible to map a new set. Plus, it was never possible to map foils.
If I were to buy a pack of sealed product presumably straight from the WotC supply chain, through a vender w/o tampering, right into my hand I would expect a certain % of obtaining a high-quality card, b/c the packs are designed that way by WotC.
If the middle man strips the high value out of their packs, or only markets the packs that do not contain the high-value cards, however they have figured out how to do it, that is fraud.
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FREE MODERN. Break the Standard link.
I play Magic: the Gathering, not Magic: the Commandering.
The point I'm making is that more and more people are going singles for constructed because it is globally being pushed (and rightly so) that packs are a bad sell outside draft and limited, which is mostly played at the start of a season. Then stores have to buy mass amounts of booster boxes to get cards to sell to players and race the draft and limited openings to turn profit, getting saddled with a relentless stream of bulk fodder just to stock the cards getting used in constructed.
Wizards developers should know what cards are basically down powered versions of another card, so why are they forcing singles sellers to open tons of boxes instead of printing seller only card sets and providing better moderation? That way prices stay at least somewhat more controllable and actually gives a purpose to the wpn program.
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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!
Wouldn't an LGS box mapping and weighing packs be a form of market manipulation? You're intentionally lowering the... what's the term? ECV? Of individual packs by removing most, if not all, of the high ticket cards. Thereby artificially increasing your returns by sell8ng foils and mapped cards at a premium then selling jank packs at a premium.
I see a ton of eBay auctions for 1/2 the packs out of a box. It would be brain dead to assume they haven't been weighed and picked through.
I would consider that to be selling fraudulent product.
IANAL, but I'm pretty certain you're wrong on that, at least as far as the law is concerned. You are still purchasing packs of $set, and that's all the store is advertising to you. That the packs may not contain the cards you want is kind of irrelevant. The store didn't say "buy a pack, get a Liliana!", they said "buy a pack!"
If I buy a sealed booster pack I have a reasonable expectation that it might contain a certain card or type of card (foils, mythics, Jace, whatever). If you intentionally remove all the packs that have that card and sell me the remainder without telling me then your willful deception of the booster's contents constitutes fraud.
The point I'm making is that more and more people are going singles for constructed because it is globally being pushed (and rightly so) that packs are a bad sell outside draft and limited, which is mostly played at the start of a season. Then stores have to buy mass amounts of booster boxes to get cards to sell to players and race the draft and limited openings to turn profit, getting saddled with a relentless stream of bulk fodder just to stock the cards getting used in constructed.
Wizards developers should know what cards are basically down powered versions of another card, so why are they forcing singles sellers to open tons of boxes instead of printing seller only card sets and providing better moderation? That way prices stay at least somewhat more controllable and actually gives a purpose to the wpn program.
Because it would eventualy hit the open market, only takes one store to start selling em. I know if given the oppertunity to purchases full sets from my store say at $100 or foil sets at $200, Much cheaper then buying boxes hopeing to get what you want when you can pay 1 fix fee and get EVERYTHING you want, it creates a price cieling for sets (at least until they are out of print) The last thing single sellers want to do is create a price ceiling.
The point I'm making is that more and more people are going singles for constructed because it is globally being pushed (and rightly so) that packs are a bad sell outside draft and limited, which is mostly played at the start of a season. Then stores have to buy mass amounts of booster boxes to get cards to sell to players and race the draft and limited openings to turn profit, getting saddled with a relentless stream of bulk fodder just to stock the cards getting used in constructed.
Wizards developers should know what cards are basically down powered versions of another card, so why are they forcing singles sellers to open tons of boxes instead of printing seller only card sets and providing better moderation? That way prices stay at least somewhat more controllable and actually gives a purpose to the wpn program.
Because it would eventualy hit the open market, only takes one store to start selling em. I know if given the oppertunity to purchases full sets from my store say at $100 or foil sets at $200, Much cheaper then buying boxes hopeing to get what you want when you can pay 1 fix fee and get EVERYTHING you want, it creates a price cieling for sets (at least until they are out of print) The last thing single sellers want to do is create a price ceiling.
But that is why they'd have to be wpn stores. If a box gets sold directly wizards can track that to a specific source and they lose the privilege to get those sets. Not to mention get to know important information about the set far ahead of non wpn locations. Moderation is your friend.
And in before someone says they can't hope to track them: oh yes they can. They can track some of the most obscure stuff imaginable via intentional print defects, order numbers, region of distribution, etc. The store would get pretty screwed if they tried to sell a limited run time locked vendor only distributable product.
And if the store sells them in a way that doesn't use a way that is traceable for any reason the distributor who sold that product will get the flack.
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 point I'm making is that more and more people are going singles for constructed because it is globally being pushed (and rightly so) that packs are a bad sell outside draft and limited, which is mostly played at the start of a season. Then stores have to buy mass amounts of booster boxes to get cards to sell to players and race the draft and limited openings to turn profit, getting saddled with a relentless stream of bulk fodder just to stock the cards getting used in constructed.
Wizards developers should know what cards are basically down powered versions of another card, so why are they forcing singles sellers to open tons of boxes instead of printing seller only card sets and providing better moderation? That way prices stay at least somewhat more controllable and actually gives a purpose to the wpn program.
Because it would eventualy hit the open market, only takes one store to start selling em. I know if given the oppertunity to purchases full sets from my store say at $100 or foil sets at $200, Much cheaper then buying boxes hopeing to get what you want when you can pay 1 fix fee and get EVERYTHING you want, it creates a price cieling for sets (at least until they are out of print) The last thing single sellers want to do is create a price ceiling.
But that is why they'd have to be wpn stores. If a box gets sold directly wizards can track that to a specific source and they lose the privilege to get those sets. Not to mention get to know important information about the set far ahead of non wpn locations. Moderation is your friend.
And in before someone says they can't hope to track them: oh yes they can. They can track some of the most obscure stuff imaginable via intentional print defects, order numbers, region of distribution, etc. The store would get pretty screwed if they tried to sell a limited run time locked vendor only distributable product.
And if the store sells them in a way that doesn't use a way that is traceable for any reason the distributor who sold that product will get the flack.
I'm not sure I understand your suggestion. Several times I've heard you present arguments about how to make magic cheaper (I don't disagree with you, it is expensive), but this one would likely kill the game. First off, why would anyone buy packs if wpn stores just have the singles (and relatively cheap)? At that point, really we are just going the route of a living card game, rather than a collectible one, aren't we? Like it or not, the collectable nature of Magic, as well as associated values, is really one of the major reasons the game, as a product, works.
Again, maybe I'm just not understanding your proposition.
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Sig by Dark Night Cavalier at Heroes of the Plane Studios!
The concern is card supply and flooding the market. My suggestion isn't about increasing supply to that level, it's about balancing distribution and supplying cards in a way to singles sellers to guarantee them profits, while also more directly controlling pricing on cards.
Imagine a world where a singles seller doesn't have to spend an entire day opening and sorting a massive order of booster packs. Wizards just distributes the constructed cards in a nicely organized vendor package. There are devils in the details and wotc would have to calculate a few things, but it would be one heck of a perk to LGS. Especially on discount.
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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!
If I buy a sealed booster pack I have a reasonable expectation that it might contain a certain card or type of card (foils, mythics, Jace, whatever). If you intentionally remove all the packs that have that card and sell me the remainder without telling me then your willful deception of the booster's contents constitutes fraud.
If you buy a booster pack of $set, the business arrangement you are spending money to fulfill is that you will get 10 commons from $set, 3 uncommons from $set, 1 rare or mythic from $set, 1 basic land from $set, and 1 marketing card or token from $set, with a chance that one of the commons will be replaced by a foil of any rarity. (Some sets change the formula a bit, such as sets with DFCs, or Dragon's Maze replacing the basic with a nonbasic, but it's still consistent within the set.)
If the store were opening the packs, taking out the rares, and re-sealing them before selling to you, I would agree with you and call that fraud. But that's not the case with box mapping; you're still getting exactly what you're paying for.
Fraud has a specific legal meaning, and you should not accuse someone of fraud when that's not what's occurring. I absolutely agree that you shouldn't buy from a store that maps their boxes and takes out the packs with the good rares, but I don't agree that you should accuse them of fraud.
If I buy a sealed booster pack I have a reasonable expectation that it might contain a certain card or type of card (foils, mythics, Jace, whatever). If you intentionally remove all the packs that have that card and sell me the remainder without telling me then your willful deception of the booster's contents constitutes fraud.
If you buy a booster pack of $set, the business arrangement you are spending money to fulfill is that you will get 10 commons from $set, 3 uncommons from $set, 1 rare or mythic from $set, 1 basic land from $set, and 1 marketing card or token from $set, with a chance that one of the commons will be replaced by a foil of any rarity. (Some sets change the formula a bit, such as sets with DFCs, or Dragon's Maze replacing the basic with a nonbasic, but it's still consistent within the set.)
If the store were opening the packs, taking out the rares, and re-sealing them before selling to you, I would agree with you and call that fraud. But that's not the case with box mapping; you're still getting exactly what you're paying for.
Fraud has a specific legal meaning, and you should not accuse someone of fraud when that's not what's occurring. I absolutely agree that you shouldn't buy from a store that maps their boxes and takes out the packs with the good rares, but I don't agree that you should accuse them of fraud.
I didn't get a rare from $set though. I got a rare from $subset which you created by removing items from the box that you mapped. Not telling me (like I said in my original post) is the deception. And that's that's what makes it more than a shady business and elevates it to fraud. The willfully lie of omissions creates an intentional deception which is, usually, the biggest legal requirement of fraud.
If I buy a sealed booster pack I have a reasonable expectation that it might contain a certain card or type of card (foils, mythics, Jace, whatever). If you intentionally remove all the packs that have that card and sell me the remainder without telling me then your willful deception of the booster's contents constitutes fraud.
If you buy a booster pack of $set, the business arrangement you are spending money to fulfill is that you will get 10 commons from $set, 3 uncommons from $set, 1 rare or mythic from $set, 1 basic land from $set, and 1 marketing card or token from $set, with a chance that one of the commons will be replaced by a foil of any rarity. (Some sets change the formula a bit, such as sets with DFCs, or Dragon's Maze replacing the basic with a nonbasic, but it's still consistent within the set.)
If the store were opening the packs, taking out the rares, and re-sealing them before selling to you, I would agree with you and call that fraud. But that's not the case with box mapping; you're still getting exactly what you're paying for.
Fraud has a specific legal meaning, and you should not accuse someone of fraud when that's not what's occurring. I absolutely agree that you shouldn't buy from a store that maps their boxes and takes out the packs with the good rares, but I don't agree that you should accuse them of fraud.
I don't think you quite understand how fraud works. First off the packages say right on them 'randomly' inserted cards of all the rarities you mentioned, as a sample of the set you are buying. Having the best cards removed ahead of time means you are now getting randomly inserted cards of all rarities from a fixed subset of the set you are buying from; which actually makes the wording on the packages become fraud. think of it like this. you go to buy a fully loaded sedan from a car dealership, but upon signing the lease, you see they went and replaced the leather seats with clothe ones, took out the AC unit, and removed the sound system, but still forced you to pay full price and receive this stripped down version after. That would be fraud in any situation. this is exactly the same
If I buy a sealed booster pack I have a reasonable expectation that it might contain a certain card or type of card (foils, mythics, Jace, whatever). If you intentionally remove all the packs that have that card and sell me the remainder without telling me then your willful deception of the booster's contents constitutes fraud.
If you buy a booster pack of $set, the business arrangement you are spending money to fulfill is that you will get 10 commons from $set, 3 uncommons from $set, 1 rare or mythic from $set, 1 basic land from $set, and 1 marketing card or token from $set, with a chance that one of the commons will be replaced by a foil of any rarity. (Some sets change the formula a bit, such as sets with DFCs, or Dragon's Maze replacing the basic with a nonbasic, but it's still consistent within the set.)
If the store were opening the packs, taking out the rares, and re-sealing them before selling to you, I would agree with you and call that fraud. But that's not the case with box mapping; you're still getting exactly what you're paying for.
Fraud has a specific legal meaning, and you should not accuse someone of fraud when that's not what's occurring. I absolutely agree that you shouldn't buy from a store that maps their boxes and takes out the packs with the good rares, but I don't agree that you should accuse them of fraud.
I take the side of fraud, even though that may not be the correct term. Here's why. For the sake of berevity, I'm going to make up numbers. Plug in the correct values as you see fit.
It's all about the intent.
Out of a box of 36 boosters, there is a 1 in 8 (pack) chance of getting a mythic and a 1 in 144 chance of a "Premium" ignoring janks. Since WotC works to keep those statistic consistent, a person can buy a box and expect to at least get 4 mythics, again ignoring janks. If a store can predictably pull at least two of those mythics before setting the box out, then the pack ratio changes to 1:16.
Here's the kicker. If the last four people who bought packs each pulled the Mythic, then my chance of drawing a Mythic drops, for all intents and purposes, to zero. I don't know that my chances are now zero. But none of the four people maliciously chose that 1 pack with the mythic. There is no intent to defraud anybody. More importantly, the LGS might not know those Mythics are now gone because those people who bought those packs opened them at home.
However, if the same store opens the box and pulls out the four packs holding Mythics for the express purpose of selling those mythics as singles then sells the rest of the packs knowing full well that the chance of anybody pulling a Mythic is now zero. This exhibits intent to defraud the consumer by intentionally altering the chance to draw a mythic down to zero.
Overall, the effect is the same but the intent is radically different. That's the difference.
The same thing occurs with those eBay auctions of 18 packs. Does anyone honestly think those haven't been picked over? By not noting that they've been picked over, that's the equalivent of fraud. You intentionally removed the premiums and are selling known junk packs. Yet the price rarely reflects that. You're not going to convince me otherwise that is what is happening there.
WotC takes distribution of cards seriously and have for a long time. Remember Antiquities and the Buy Back program?
That's sort of the problem with booster packs: The more you know about how they "work", the less inclined you are to buy them. It's why the booster boxes for Modern Masters are 188 msrp even with the box EV being relatively good. People don't want to gamble to get the cards they need and sellers would rather hold onto cards that carried a previously high value and wait the price dip out than crack more boxes. To make products that really endure and target the constructed market, they can't be composed of lotto tickets. Players have to have a guarantee that they get the cards they are looking for from buying a product for constructed play, especially in modern.
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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!
That's sort of the problem with booster packs: The more you know about how they "work", the less inclined you are to buy them. It's why the booster boxes for Modern Masters are 188 msrp even with the box EV being relatively good. People don't want to gamble to get the cards they need and sellers would rather hold onto cards that carried a previously high value and wait the price dip out than crack more boxes. To make products that really endure and target the constructed market, they can't be composed of lotto tickets. Players have to have a guarantee that they get the cards they are looking for from buying a product for constructed play, especially in modern.
If they did that though, they'll have to literally drop every support for non-Standard constructed formats (or power-creep them to oblivion in the next few years before dropping them completely), because the whole business model becomes "New cards come out, buy what you need for Standard, then throw away all cards that rotated out because they are worthless cardboard now." They have to actively make cardboard useless (via power-creep or true-rotation) in order to push the new cards and they need to push the new cards a lot harder because the entire lotto system (along with Limited) isn't there to magnify profits already.
The biggest spenders ultimately aren't the ones who spend one huge amount on a product - it's those who continuously spend money over a long period of time and the natures of the lotto system, the Limited system and the rotation system all works towards that.
We had products catered towards the former before - FTVs are some sort of example (or rather the nearest one even if it isn't 100% accurate) - they have to be high-priced because if you're going to spend money once, they need you to shell out the equivalent of how much you would have spent in the next few years if you were the continuously-contributing type. In fact, the more enduring the product, the more years they need to add to that equation.
For example, if they wanted to sell Tarmogoyf as singles now, they need to calculate literally how much profits they would make because of Goyf from all future Modern Master sets (taking the generous assumption Goyf is in all of them), then divide that against the projected number of Goyfs they will sell to determine how much it needs to make in order to be equally profitable and I'm confident that amount is more than its current Secondary Market pricing (even if we take into account they're printing other cards besides Goyf to share the burden, because calculated risks are very conservative on the financial side).
If you want a guarantee, they also want a guarantee - in the form of cold, hard cash you would have spent over the new few years (or decades even considering how long the game lasted). Let's just say way there are way fewer people are willing to shell out this exchange of guarantee than there are people willing to play the lotto system instead.
Bluntly put, you can't have this guarantee and have it cheap - that's just telling them "Screw your business and give me what I want". You'll need to offer something equal to what they're exchanging for this guarantee.
That's sort of the problem with booster packs: The more you know about how they "work", the less inclined you are to buy them. It's why the booster boxes for Modern Masters are 188 msrp even with the box EV being relatively good. People don't want to gamble to get the cards they need and sellers would rather hold onto cards that carried a previously high value and wait the price dip out than crack more boxes. To make products that really endure and target the constructed market, they can't be composed of lotto tickets. Players have to have a guarantee that they get the cards they are looking for from buying a product for constructed play, especially in modern.
If they did that though, they'll have to literally drop every support for non-Standard constructed formats (or power-creep them to oblivion in the next few years before dropping them completely), because the whole business model becomes "New cards come out, buy what you need for Standard, then throw away all cards that rotated out because they are worthless cardboard now." They have to actively make cardboard useless (via power-creep or true-rotation) in order to push the new cards and they need to push the new cards a lot harder because the entire lotto system (along with Limited) isn't there to magnify profits already.
The biggest spenders ultimately aren't the ones who spend one huge amount on a product - it's those who continuously spend money over a long period of time and the natures of the lotto system, the Limited system and the rotation system all works towards that.
We had products catered towards the former before - FTVs are some sort of example (or rather the nearest one even if it isn't 100% accurate) - they have to be high-priced because if you're going to spend money once, they need you to shell out the equivalent of how much you would have spent in the next few years if you were the continuously-contributing type. In fact, the more enduring the product, the more years they need to add to that equation.
For example, if they wanted to sell Tarmogoyf as singles now, they need to calculate literally how much profits they would make because of Goyf from all future Modern Master sets (taking the generous assumption Goyf is in all of them), then divide that against the projected number of Goyfs they will sell to determine how much it needs to make in order to be equally profitable and I'm confident that amount is more than its current Secondary Market pricing (even if we take into account they're printing other cards besides Goyf to share the burden, because calculated risks are very conservative on the financial side).
If you want a guarantee, they also want a guarantee - in the form of cold, hard cash you would have spent over the new few years (or decades even considering how long the game lasted). Let's just say way there are way fewer people are willing to shell out this exchange of guarantee than there are people willing to play the lotto system instead.
Bluntly put, you can't have this guarantee and have it cheap - that's just telling them "Screw your business and give me what I want". You'll need to offer something equal to what they're exchanging for this guarantee.
I'm not even sure if that's what a lot of players really want. A guarantee that the packs they open will meet or exceed the MSRP.
It seems like players are really asking for more cards playable outside of Standard. Either through core cards like Lightning Bolt and Counterspell or some sort of workable equivalent. Not the watered down versions we're being offered. Players want to know the $100/box they spend results in cards that are... well... playable once they rotate out of Standard. They're tired of the filler cards that serve almost no other purpose than to be draftable in whatever set they come from. They're tired of Masterpieces influencing sealed games even though they're not part of the set and influencing the overall card values of each box. IMHO, they also influence the power level of the set.
I think many people are tired of the price speculators hoarding cards and driving the costs of cards through the roof. Seriously, Mishra's Bauble should not be a $25 card and Force of Will has no business being triple digits just to name two. I'm someone who owns no less than 10 copies of FoW last I counted and I'm literally asking WotC to print more even if it tanks the price like they did to Sinkhole.
I talk about spells like Bolt, but I'm also talking about creatures too. I think players want to see meaningful creatures again. Goblins, Vampires, Bees, Wolves, Harpies, Snakes (real ones), Spiders, etc. Seems like some will even settle for accurate representations of Non-Western cultural tropes. Things that are directly relatable to familiar animals and mythos. I'm not saying print more rares like Goyf (well... I am but), they need to print more meaningful and useful cards at the common and uncommon levels. I suspect printing more meaningful common and uncommon cards that can properly answer the Rare and Mythics would go a long way in reducing the pressure on those high tickett cards.
That's sort of the problem with booster packs: The more you know about how they "work", the less inclined you are to buy them. It's why the booster boxes for Modern Masters are 188 msrp even with the box EV being relatively good. People don't want to gamble to get the cards they need and sellers would rather hold onto cards that carried a previously high value and wait the price dip out than crack more boxes. To make products that really endure and target the constructed market, they can't be composed of lotto tickets. Players have to have a guarantee that they get the cards they are looking for from buying a product for constructed play, especially in modern.
If they did that though, they'll have to literally drop every support for non-Standard constructed formats (or power-creep them to oblivion in the next few years before dropping them completely), because the whole business model becomes "New cards come out, buy what you need for Standard, then throw away all cards that rotated out because they are worthless cardboard now." They have to actively make cardboard useless (via power-creep or true-rotation) in order to push the new cards and they need to push the new cards a lot harder because the entire lotto system (along with Limited) isn't there to magnify profits already.
The biggest spenders ultimately aren't the ones who spend one huge amount on a product - it's those who continuously spend money over a long period of time and the natures of the lotto system, the Limited system and the rotation system all works towards that.
We had products catered towards the former before - FTVs are some sort of example (or rather the nearest one even if it isn't 100% accurate) - they have to be high-priced because if you're going to spend money once, they need you to shell out the equivalent of how much you would have spent in the next few years if you were the continuously-contributing type. In fact, the more enduring the product, the more years they need to add to that equation.
For example, if they wanted to sell Tarmogoyf as singles now, they need to calculate literally how much profits they would make because of Goyf from all future Modern Master sets (taking the generous assumption Goyf is in all of them), then divide that against the projected number of Goyfs they will sell to determine how much it needs to make in order to be equally profitable and I'm confident that amount is more than its current Secondary Market pricing (even if we take into account they're printing other cards besides Goyf to share the burden, because calculated risks are very conservative on the financial side).
If you want a guarantee, they also want a guarantee - in the form of cold, hard cash you would have spent over the new few years (or decades even considering how long the game lasted). Let's just say way there are way fewer people are willing to shell out this exchange of guarantee than there are people willing to play the lotto system instead.
Bluntly put, you can't have this guarantee and have it cheap - that's just telling them "Screw your business and give me what I want". You'll need to offer something equal to what they're exchanging for this guarantee.
The model has to go Yatsufusa because it doesn't work for constructed play. It's broken, people have been gaming it for years at the cost of people who play the game, and the entire reason wizards gave up on the FTV series has nothing to do with the reasons you may be alluding to (that was more so part of them dropping support for the WPN program). If they did more things like FTV except they are instant collections and printed those at 99 msrp a box, did this repeatedly semi-annually, and did big enough runs it would likely solve just about all the issues of getting access to non-rotating formats like modern. And I'm talking sets meant to get people building decks with good cards, not the crap they call deck builders toolkits they leave sitting on the shelves because they are scared to death of arbitrage.
The only thing the current market does is scare off those not already in love with the game, force players into an uncomfortable position of having to decide to buy a single because it's price "may spike soon" instead of buying cards that they really need for a deck, and teaching players that they shouldn't make their own decks, but instead save up tons of money to buy a net deck because it is too expensive to brew and make your own deck for a non-rotating format in paper. On top of which, the internet of things is teaching people that to build good decks in non-rotating formats they have to go use cards that are often out of print for 5+ years, which has lead to wizards having to try and reprint older cards in a frantic frenzy using the wrong methods and price structure. If a card is in high demand from a tournament, you aren't going to satisfy that demand printing them at mythic in a 200+ msrp box set. The singles sellers will break them open, set a really high floor, and the entire thing falls apart.
Let's see, they can print 25 good cards in a box set in pairs for 100 usd, or they can print 270 unique cards, only 25 of which people even give a damn about according to TCGPlayer, and the rest all go to bulk status. Good use of paper there, wizards. Oh, and you mathematically have the worst chances possible to pull any of those cards as a player, thus leaving all of the power in the mass box openers hands, because that's always worked to satisfy demand... And then they aren't going to ever reprint many of these chase cards in standard again, thus negating the entire reason for not reprinting them elsewhere in good number and letting the 2nd hand market prices lock out reprints due to fear...
Is this saying print them to the point of oblivion and crash all these rares and mythics to like 5 dollars? No. But they should be printing enough to keep chase rares and mythics of any format from sky rocketing into the moon like zendikar fetches and Noble Hierarch.
Right now I'm sure wizards wishes they could just erase all these old cards from history and not deal with them. They basically created the secondary market with their own negligence by spreading themselves too thin and not paying attention to what people actually wanted from Magic, and when the boom happened in RtR it just magnified how bad their own model of distribution was for both constructed and casual formats. Now they are trying to fix the model by printing more anthologies, Commander, 2nd waves of masters products, etc, but they waited too long because it seems the school of hard knox was the only way to get them to see they had issues with standards non-rotating safety net and act on them. Wizards is in literal full red alert all hands on deck mode right now on two completely different fronts.
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!
Also, going to add that another aspect of this entire thing is that TCGs were about trading cards to get what you want with other people. That's why the booster packs originally worked fine and had better value: people would open them, make trade binders, and then actively find other players to get those cards. It was also easier for companies like Wizards of the Coast to just drop a set and then forget about the cards because once the set was out of print the only remnants of those cards were in the trade binders of people who were playing locally and trading. Once big online card selling began suddenly the trade binder became digital with dollar signs attached, and cards could be had from any point in time for the right price. Combine that with the tournament and competitive scene plus places like MTGgoldfish and now cards that are out of print are never out of the public eye. This is a huge problem for a model that was originally built around "set and forget" + local trade binders. Wizards can mess with rarity schemes and incentivise pack openings, but with online selling of singles and an active tournament scene they can't stop people from demanding cards that are long since gone. Then combine that with people actively saying that booster packs are the worst value for players financially with very good arguments to back that up, and suddenly you see why pack openings are like flash in the pan moments at the release of each new set now.
There is no "players should be expected to pay x amount based on how many boosters for a given single." That horse is dead. It was shot, buried, and then had it's grave paved over with ebay and TCGPlayer.com. The vast majority of players don't trade cards or gamble when they can just pop online and buy the things they want. The trouble is the entire economy for this form of purchasing is under-developed and wizards is living in a magical fantasy land that they think they still are the masters of.
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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!
I think magic cards should come in random boosters, and that this is an undeniable fact. I don't think things are good the way they are now, but I think random boosters should be improved, not discarded. What are the problems?
First off, here's some math. I had been complaining earlier about Mythic Rarity screwing things up, but when I did the math things turned out a bit different, still worse but for different reasons than I had been saying. The current major expansion sets have 15 Mythic Rare, 53 Rare, and 80 uncommon cards in random boosters. In order to get 4 each of each of the Mythic Rares mathematically, you would need to open 480 packs. After opening 480 packs, you would also get roughly 8 of each Rare(making Mythic Rares roughly twice as rare) and 18 of each Uncommon. Compare this to the old way, with a 350 card set with 110 Rare and 110 Uncommon cards. You would need to open 440 boosters(very close to the 480 for modern sets) to mathematically get 4 of each rare, and opening 440 boosters would net roughly 12 of each Uncommon. This basically means that Mythic Rare cards are roughly as rare as Rare cards were before the change, that current Rare cards are only half as Rare as Rares used to be, and that Uncommons are 50% more common than they were before. This means that in general, the rare slots and uncommon slots in current packs are worth less than under the old system, because the cards in those slots are mathematically more common.
The second issue with boosters is being able to pull playable cards. Opening boosters can be satisfying in terms of monetary value, or play value. Now, play value can be relative, as cards can be valuable in terms of casual/newbie play, Commander jank, or competitive constructed. I would say that the last 4 Standard blocks have been falling short for all three. Now, building sets has to serve multiple masters, like limited play and storyline flavor, that can conflict with cards having constructed play value. In recent years there has also been more focus on Rare cards being stronger than Uncommon cards being stronger than Common cards. Anecdotally speaking, older sets seemed to have more Uncommon and Common cards playable in constructed, which made it, again anecdotally speaking, more enjoyable to open packs.
I agree with you Casualoblivion that booster packs are salvageable as far as standard is concerned, and truth be told I'm not even advocating they abandon booster packs. It's more so the problem with how to handle older cards that never will see a reprint in the planned future that people still need in historic formats like modern or legacy. Those cards have ballooned in value due to no support and the booster pack model doesn't really work for these sets due to the need of booster pack sets to be draftable, not just a collection of needed reprints. I think in these cases repurposing the Deck builders toolkits and other similar product lines to incorporate these cards is for the best.
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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!
I take the side of fraud, even though that may not be the correct term. Here's why.
It doesn't matter how wrong you think box mapping is or why. If it's not fraud, you should not call it fraud, because doing so opens you up for the potential of a defamation case against you.
I take the side of fraud, even though that may not be the correct term. Here's why.
It doesn't matter how wrong you think box mapping is or why. If it's not fraud, you should not call it fraud, because doing so opens you up for the potential of a defamation case against you.
What is the correct term then? Market manipulation? Odds manipulation?
I take the side of fraud, even though that may not be the correct term. Here's why.
It doesn't matter how wrong you think box mapping is or why. If it's not fraud, you should not call it fraud, because doing so opens you up for the potential of a defamation case against you.
I take the side of fraud, even though that may not be the correct term. Here's why.
It doesn't matter how wrong you think box mapping is or why. If it's not fraud, you should not call it fraud, because doing so opens you up for the potential of a defamation case against you.
What is the correct term then? Market manipulation? Odds manipulation?
I don't know much about other formats, but here's wrong with THE format that I play - Modern.
1. We have players here that have come to the realization that Wizards does not want Counterspell to ever hit Standard or Modern. Yet, Wizards is trying to find a way to make a better Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek, another creature that "if it goes to the graveyard from anywhere, put back onto the battlefield tapped" creature, and a (Green) creature that will put Thragtusk to shame. To put it more succinctly, Counterspell is silly broken for Modern, but a 1GG 4/3 flying, haste, first strike, trample, cannot be countered (by what, Wizards?) is completely fine, not just for Modern, but for Standard and Limited as well.
2. Too many bans. Standard received a ridiculous amount of bans, then the Cat after the deadline. It was definitely the right ban after those other ones. And Aetherworks Marvel is also the right ban now. Poor Wizards, losing consumer confidence and all...
3. Too many other things to get into, but there is a silver lining.
The silver lining is that Magic is in a really good spot right now. Are there things that could be better? Yes, it is so for anything that is worth doing.
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Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
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Players are not laying booster packs like chickens... booster packs come from somewhere...
In the long run, wizards is not loosing money. How the players get the card and how the second market gets the cards do reflect to the cost of the singles, but all cards start from one source (Wizards).
So far I'm not sure what this tread is about... The only thing comes to my mind is 'there is nothing wrong with magic' but 'there is something seriously wrong some players and their views of the Collectible Card Game'
My take of the game is 50% hobby, 25% casual (EDH and Multi-player decks) and 25% tournament (Legacy/Frontier). I do have a couple decks focused on tournaments but it's not the core of my interest with the game, but they don't have proxies. I have a few EDH decks pimped out (My Relentless Rats deck has a beta Demonic Tutor and a beta Sol Ring a foil necro and some other cards... When I play the deck it feels like I'm showing off my collection - but it's an awesome feeling As for a Hobby I try to keep myself informed with all the latest tricks/strategies and I do buy singes that I do think are good deals.
In his Second 100 days - Yawgmoth's Bargain is unrestricted in Vintage.
What is going to happen in the Next 100 days!!!
Wizards has taken steps to prevent box mapping, several times over the years. At this point it's nearly impossible to map a new set. Plus, it was never possible to map foils.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
If I were to buy a pack of sealed product presumably straight from the WotC supply chain, through a vender w/o tampering, right into my hand I would expect a certain % of obtaining a high-quality card, b/c the packs are designed that way by WotC.
If the middle man strips the high value out of their packs, or only markets the packs that do not contain the high-value cards, however they have figured out how to do it, that is fraud.
I play Magic: the Gathering, not Magic: the Commandering.
Wizards developers should know what cards are basically down powered versions of another card, so why are they forcing singles sellers to open tons of boxes instead of printing seller only card sets and providing better moderation? That way prices stay at least somewhat more controllable and actually gives a purpose to the wpn program.
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!
If I buy a sealed booster pack I have a reasonable expectation that it might contain a certain card or type of card (foils, mythics, Jace, whatever). If you intentionally remove all the packs that have that card and sell me the remainder without telling me then your willful deception of the booster's contents constitutes fraud.
Because it would eventualy hit the open market, only takes one store to start selling em. I know if given the oppertunity to purchases full sets from my store say at $100 or foil sets at $200, Much cheaper then buying boxes hopeing to get what you want when you can pay 1 fix fee and get EVERYTHING you want, it creates a price cieling for sets (at least until they are out of print) The last thing single sellers want to do is create a price ceiling.
But that is why they'd have to be wpn stores. If a box gets sold directly wizards can track that to a specific source and they lose the privilege to get those sets. Not to mention get to know important information about the set far ahead of non wpn locations. Moderation is your friend.
And in before someone says they can't hope to track them: oh yes they can. They can track some of the most obscure stuff imaginable via intentional print defects, order numbers, region of distribution, etc. The store would get pretty screwed if they tried to sell a limited run time locked vendor only distributable product.
And if the store sells them in a way that doesn't use a way that is traceable for any reason the distributor who sold that product will get the flack.
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 sure I understand your suggestion. Several times I've heard you present arguments about how to make magic cheaper (I don't disagree with you, it is expensive), but this one would likely kill the game. First off, why would anyone buy packs if wpn stores just have the singles (and relatively cheap)? At that point, really we are just going the route of a living card game, rather than a collectible one, aren't we? Like it or not, the collectable nature of Magic, as well as associated values, is really one of the major reasons the game, as a product, works.
Again, maybe I'm just not understanding your proposition.
Imagine a world where a singles seller doesn't have to spend an entire day opening and sorting a massive order of booster packs. Wizards just distributes the constructed cards in a nicely organized vendor package. There are devils in the details and wotc would have to calculate a few things, but it would be one heck of a perk to LGS. Especially on discount.
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!
If the store were opening the packs, taking out the rares, and re-sealing them before selling to you, I would agree with you and call that fraud. But that's not the case with box mapping; you're still getting exactly what you're paying for.
Fraud has a specific legal meaning, and you should not accuse someone of fraud when that's not what's occurring. I absolutely agree that you shouldn't buy from a store that maps their boxes and takes out the packs with the good rares, but I don't agree that you should accuse them of fraud.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
I don't think you quite understand how fraud works. First off the packages say right on them 'randomly' inserted cards of all the rarities you mentioned, as a sample of the set you are buying. Having the best cards removed ahead of time means you are now getting randomly inserted cards of all rarities from a fixed subset of the set you are buying from; which actually makes the wording on the packages become fraud. think of it like this. you go to buy a fully loaded sedan from a car dealership, but upon signing the lease, you see they went and replaced the leather seats with clothe ones, took out the AC unit, and removed the sound system, but still forced you to pay full price and receive this stripped down version after. That would be fraud in any situation. this is exactly the same
I take the side of fraud, even though that may not be the correct term. Here's why. For the sake of berevity, I'm going to make up numbers. Plug in the correct values as you see fit.
It's all about the intent.
Out of a box of 36 boosters, there is a 1 in 8 (pack) chance of getting a mythic and a 1 in 144 chance of a "Premium" ignoring janks. Since WotC works to keep those statistic consistent, a person can buy a box and expect to at least get 4 mythics, again ignoring janks. If a store can predictably pull at least two of those mythics before setting the box out, then the pack ratio changes to 1:16.
Here's the kicker. If the last four people who bought packs each pulled the Mythic, then my chance of drawing a Mythic drops, for all intents and purposes, to zero. I don't know that my chances are now zero. But none of the four people maliciously chose that 1 pack with the mythic. There is no intent to defraud anybody. More importantly, the LGS might not know those Mythics are now gone because those people who bought those packs opened them at home.
However, if the same store opens the box and pulls out the four packs holding Mythics for the express purpose of selling those mythics as singles then sells the rest of the packs knowing full well that the chance of anybody pulling a Mythic is now zero. This exhibits intent to defraud the consumer by intentionally altering the chance to draw a mythic down to zero.
Overall, the effect is the same but the intent is radically different. That's the difference.
The same thing occurs with those eBay auctions of 18 packs. Does anyone honestly think those haven't been picked over? By not noting that they've been picked over, that's the equalivent of fraud. You intentionally removed the premiums and are selling known junk packs. Yet the price rarely reflects that. You're not going to convince me otherwise that is what is happening there.
WotC takes distribution of cards seriously and have for a long time. Remember Antiquities and the Buy Back program?
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!
If they did that though, they'll have to literally drop every support for non-Standard constructed formats (or power-creep them to oblivion in the next few years before dropping them completely), because the whole business model becomes "New cards come out, buy what you need for Standard, then throw away all cards that rotated out because they are worthless cardboard now." They have to actively make cardboard useless (via power-creep or true-rotation) in order to push the new cards and they need to push the new cards a lot harder because the entire lotto system (along with Limited) isn't there to magnify profits already.
The biggest spenders ultimately aren't the ones who spend one huge amount on a product - it's those who continuously spend money over a long period of time and the natures of the lotto system, the Limited system and the rotation system all works towards that.
We had products catered towards the former before - FTVs are some sort of example (or rather the nearest one even if it isn't 100% accurate) - they have to be high-priced because if you're going to spend money once, they need you to shell out the equivalent of how much you would have spent in the next few years if you were the continuously-contributing type. In fact, the more enduring the product, the more years they need to add to that equation.
For example, if they wanted to sell Tarmogoyf as singles now, they need to calculate literally how much profits they would make because of Goyf from all future Modern Master sets (taking the generous assumption Goyf is in all of them), then divide that against the projected number of Goyfs they will sell to determine how much it needs to make in order to be equally profitable and I'm confident that amount is more than its current Secondary Market pricing (even if we take into account they're printing other cards besides Goyf to share the burden, because calculated risks are very conservative on the financial side).
If you want a guarantee, they also want a guarantee - in the form of cold, hard cash you would have spent over the new few years (or decades even considering how long the game lasted). Let's just say way there are way fewer people are willing to shell out this exchange of guarantee than there are people willing to play the lotto system instead.
Bluntly put, you can't have this guarantee and have it cheap - that's just telling them "Screw your business and give me what I want". You'll need to offer something equal to what they're exchanging for this guarantee.
I'm not even sure if that's what a lot of players really want. A guarantee that the packs they open will meet or exceed the MSRP.
It seems like players are really asking for more cards playable outside of Standard. Either through core cards like Lightning Bolt and Counterspell or some sort of workable equivalent. Not the watered down versions we're being offered. Players want to know the $100/box they spend results in cards that are... well... playable once they rotate out of Standard. They're tired of the filler cards that serve almost no other purpose than to be draftable in whatever set they come from. They're tired of Masterpieces influencing sealed games even though they're not part of the set and influencing the overall card values of each box. IMHO, they also influence the power level of the set.
I think many people are tired of the price speculators hoarding cards and driving the costs of cards through the roof. Seriously, Mishra's Bauble should not be a $25 card and Force of Will has no business being triple digits just to name two. I'm someone who owns no less than 10 copies of FoW last I counted and I'm literally asking WotC to print more even if it tanks the price like they did to Sinkhole.
I talk about spells like Bolt, but I'm also talking about creatures too. I think players want to see meaningful creatures again. Goblins, Vampires, Bees, Wolves, Harpies, Snakes (real ones), Spiders, etc. Seems like some will even settle for accurate representations of Non-Western cultural tropes. Things that are directly relatable to familiar animals and mythos. I'm not saying print more rares like Goyf (well... I am but), they need to print more meaningful and useful cards at the common and uncommon levels. I suspect printing more meaningful common and uncommon cards that can properly answer the Rare and Mythics would go a long way in reducing the pressure on those high tickett cards.
The model has to go Yatsufusa because it doesn't work for constructed play. It's broken, people have been gaming it for years at the cost of people who play the game, and the entire reason wizards gave up on the FTV series has nothing to do with the reasons you may be alluding to (that was more so part of them dropping support for the WPN program). If they did more things like FTV except they are instant collections and printed those at 99 msrp a box, did this repeatedly semi-annually, and did big enough runs it would likely solve just about all the issues of getting access to non-rotating formats like modern. And I'm talking sets meant to get people building decks with good cards, not the crap they call deck builders toolkits they leave sitting on the shelves because they are scared to death of arbitrage.
The only thing the current market does is scare off those not already in love with the game, force players into an uncomfortable position of having to decide to buy a single because it's price "may spike soon" instead of buying cards that they really need for a deck, and teaching players that they shouldn't make their own decks, but instead save up tons of money to buy a net deck because it is too expensive to brew and make your own deck for a non-rotating format in paper. On top of which, the internet of things is teaching people that to build good decks in non-rotating formats they have to go use cards that are often out of print for 5+ years, which has lead to wizards having to try and reprint older cards in a frantic frenzy using the wrong methods and price structure. If a card is in high demand from a tournament, you aren't going to satisfy that demand printing them at mythic in a 200+ msrp box set. The singles sellers will break them open, set a really high floor, and the entire thing falls apart.
Let's see, they can print 25 good cards in a box set in pairs for 100 usd, or they can print 270 unique cards, only 25 of which people even give a damn about according to TCGPlayer, and the rest all go to bulk status. Good use of paper there, wizards. Oh, and you mathematically have the worst chances possible to pull any of those cards as a player, thus leaving all of the power in the mass box openers hands, because that's always worked to satisfy demand... And then they aren't going to ever reprint many of these chase cards in standard again, thus negating the entire reason for not reprinting them elsewhere in good number and letting the 2nd hand market prices lock out reprints due to fear...
Is this saying print them to the point of oblivion and crash all these rares and mythics to like 5 dollars? No. But they should be printing enough to keep chase rares and mythics of any format from sky rocketing into the moon like zendikar fetches and Noble Hierarch.
Right now I'm sure wizards wishes they could just erase all these old cards from history and not deal with them. They basically created the secondary market with their own negligence by spreading themselves too thin and not paying attention to what people actually wanted from Magic, and when the boom happened in RtR it just magnified how bad their own model of distribution was for both constructed and casual formats. Now they are trying to fix the model by printing more anthologies, Commander, 2nd waves of masters products, etc, but they waited too long because it seems the school of hard knox was the only way to get them to see they had issues with standards non-rotating safety net and act on them. Wizards is in literal full red alert all hands on deck mode right now on two completely different fronts.
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 is no "players should be expected to pay x amount based on how many boosters for a given single." That horse is dead. It was shot, buried, and then had it's grave paved over with ebay and TCGPlayer.com. The vast majority of players don't trade cards or gamble when they can just pop online and buy the things they want. The trouble is the entire economy for this form of purchasing is under-developed and wizards is living in a magical fantasy land that they think they still are the masters of.
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!
First off, here's some math. I had been complaining earlier about Mythic Rarity screwing things up, but when I did the math things turned out a bit different, still worse but for different reasons than I had been saying. The current major expansion sets have 15 Mythic Rare, 53 Rare, and 80 uncommon cards in random boosters. In order to get 4 each of each of the Mythic Rares mathematically, you would need to open 480 packs. After opening 480 packs, you would also get roughly 8 of each Rare(making Mythic Rares roughly twice as rare) and 18 of each Uncommon. Compare this to the old way, with a 350 card set with 110 Rare and 110 Uncommon cards. You would need to open 440 boosters(very close to the 480 for modern sets) to mathematically get 4 of each rare, and opening 440 boosters would net roughly 12 of each Uncommon. This basically means that Mythic Rare cards are roughly as rare as Rare cards were before the change, that current Rare cards are only half as Rare as Rares used to be, and that Uncommons are 50% more common than they were before. This means that in general, the rare slots and uncommon slots in current packs are worth less than under the old system, because the cards in those slots are mathematically more common.
The second issue with boosters is being able to pull playable cards. Opening boosters can be satisfying in terms of monetary value, or play value. Now, play value can be relative, as cards can be valuable in terms of casual/newbie play, Commander jank, or competitive constructed. I would say that the last 4 Standard blocks have been falling short for all three. Now, building sets has to serve multiple masters, like limited play and storyline flavor, that can conflict with cards having constructed play value. In recent years there has also been more focus on Rare cards being stronger than Uncommon cards being stronger than Common cards. Anecdotally speaking, older sets seemed to have more Uncommon and Common cards playable in constructed, which made it, again anecdotally speaking, more enjoyable to open 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!
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
What is the correct term then? Market manipulation? Odds manipulation?
https://www.google.com/amp/www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-lottery-lawsuit-met-20170207-story,amp.html
Booster packs are a lot like lottery tickets, buyers need to have a chance to win
the grand prizea Tarmogoyf. If you remove them via mapping, well, read of my other posts.1. We have players here that have come to the realization that Wizards does not want Counterspell to ever hit Standard or Modern. Yet, Wizards is trying to find a way to make a better Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek, another creature that "if it goes to the graveyard from anywhere, put back onto the battlefield tapped" creature, and a (Green) creature that will put Thragtusk to shame. To put it more succinctly, Counterspell is silly broken for Modern, but a 1GG 4/3 flying, haste, first strike, trample, cannot be countered (by what, Wizards?) is completely fine, not just for Modern, but for Standard and Limited as well.
2. Too many bans. Standard received a ridiculous amount of bans, then the Cat after the deadline. It was definitely the right ban after those other ones. And Aetherworks Marvel is also the right ban now. Poor Wizards, losing consumer confidence and all...
3. Too many other things to get into, but there is a silver lining.
The silver lining is that Magic is in a really good spot right now. Are there things that could be better? Yes, it is so for anything that is worth doing.
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)