FoW in the new card frame is welcome though. One that is slightly more obtainable. I hope it won't go for too much though. $60 would be ideal... Am I being too optimistic?
Believe it or not I REALLY want Tragic Poet to be in this as a common in the new border too.
FoW in the new card frame is welcome though. One that is slightly more obtainable. I hope it won't go for too much though. $60 would be ideal... Am I being too optimistic?
Believe it or not I REALLY want Tragic Poet to be in this as a common in the new border too.
Really depends on whether or not people use this as an excuse to start buying into legacy or not. If they do, Force may skyrocket. But the duals are such a hindrance, it very well may tank the price. I'm rather curious to see which way it turns.
That's a rather specific card. It does have pretty art though, never seen it before.
It was like $30 until a couple years ago. Unless the interest in vintage/legacy goes up or Commander heads toward broken combo in a lot of places, it probably drops quite a bit.
After thinking more about what little has been spoiled from this set, it seems pretty apparent it's not going to do much to bring down prices on Legacy staples. Wasteland and Force of Will getting rarity upshifted to Rare and Mythic as opposed to leaving them at Uncommon as they were originally printed isn't going to lower their cost, it'll just drive it up. If Tarmogoyf in Modern Masters is any indication this set is just going to increase the cost of eternal format cards rather than lower it. I'm starting to think that the people who handle the reprints in YuGiOh need to take over reprinting in MtG if eternal formats are ever going to be affordable to play again.
I'm going to go ahead and guess that this is going to be way, way more aimed at putting EDH and Cube staples into print in a way that they can't with the EDH precons, and that Vintage and Legacy stuff is going to be mostly incidental. Wizards has been trying to kill Legacy for quite some time, so why would they stop now?
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I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
I'm not annoyed...just seriously urinated. I never bought any MM or MM2 due to the price, nor participated in any drafts of it. Now here's a set with cards that I presumably care about and WotC have to be uber-greedy. I don't care about foils being in every pack. I want to be able to enjoy something WotC publishes, as there has been little in 3 years I have been that happy with, save for the Commander 2014 decks.
best autocorrect I've seen all day.
But really, why be irritated? They made a product you can't afford a bunch of other people can. I see nothing wrong with that. And if you think this is greedy, you should see most other game companies I see.
But really, why be irritated? They made a product you can't afford a bunch of other people can. I see nothing wrong with that. And if you think this is greedy, you should see most other game companies I see.
Is it too much to ask nowadays, as a consumer, that a company make the products you want affordable? Especially given that said products are only expensive due to artificial scarcity; premium Magic products don't require more resources/labor to manufacture unlike other goods. Force of Will is just as easy to print as Kitesail Scout.
Tarmogoyf went up because the increase in demand created by MM far exceeded the increase in supply. It's a very different scenario for Legacy and EDH cards. The reserved list is still an impassable hurdle. There will not be a dramatic increase in demand for Force of Will... not without a drastic change to Legacy to make it supportable (such as the reserved list ban I was talking about earlier). The same people who want these cards now will want them after the set comes out. No one is going to open a Force of Will and say, "well now I have to finish my playset", not unless they already have blue duals, but again, thats the same market/demand that already exists. The only thing going up here is supply. It won't be "interesting to see" like so many people are suggesting. It's very basic economics. Once this set drops, the price of every card reprinted in it will go down. Think of Conspiracy for a more accurate analogy. Although, the temporary hype train will be strong with this one.
People seem to forget you can play Khans fetches and Shocklands. Yes, it's not as good as ABUR duals, but it's a relatively cheaper way to get into Legacy without making the huge financial plunge. A number of students who play at the Legacy FNMs do just that and seem to still do fine (2-2 and 3-1). And even without those, prior to this set, you could have played Burn, Merfolk, and Death and Taxes without buying a single dual land.
Hopefully this set prints other things such as Sensei's Divining Top, Stoneforge Mystic (the leaker mentioned this), Umezawa's Jitte, lots of pieces for Death and Taxes (none of it is on the reserved list), etc. I have my doubts given previous MM products (where there was just a bit of value and nothing in uncommon), but one can hope that it will drive up Legacy interest and give a path to getting into the format I (and many others) love.
The biggest hurdle people have in the eternal formats is acquisition of non basic lands. Wasteland is a good start but I would like to see ancient tomb, inkmoth, port and bowl show up in this set.
This list is living the dream. I sincerely hope we get something at least close to this. Realistically I know we will not see money across the board in all rarities. We will end up with literal duds from a cash perspective. And while the set will probably be great to draft, people will just buy it out and rip it off the shelves. Me included. All in all though I think a majority of things here hit home fairly solid.
I'm not annoyed...just seriously urinated. I never bought any MM or MM2 due to the price, nor participated in any drafts of it. Now here's a set with cards that I presumably care about and WotC have to be uber-greedy. I don't care about foils being in every pack. I want to be able to enjoy something WotC publishes, as there has been little in 3 years I have been that happy with, save for the Commander 2014 decks.
best autocorrect I've seen all day.
But really, why be irritated? They made a product you can't afford a bunch of other people can. I see nothing wrong with that. And if you think this is greedy, you should see most other game companies I see.
1) Not an autocorrect...just didn't know if MTGS was OK with using that word or not. Besides, we penguins are expected to do things with panache.
2) Like someone later said, artificial scarcity. It's like that annying fisherman in the commericals that say "Ooh, you almost had it". I'd rather punch the fisherman and get the prize.
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Intensity, Integrity, Intelligence, Personified and Penguinified.
1) Not an autocorrect...just didn't know if MTGS was OK with using that word or not. Besides, we penguins are expected to do things with panache.
2) Like someone later said, artificial scarcity. It's like that annying fisherman in the commericals that say "Ooh, you almost had it". I'd rather punch the fisherman and get the prize.
Yeah... I'd rather just walk away because it wasn't mine in the first place.
I really don't get all the crying about the reserve list. Whether you like it or not it is important. No one is going to buy a box of new cards if they were worthless. Anyone who says that just to play and have fun, with zero return on investment, is going to drop several hundred dollars on a every new set to play standard and not care its worthless is lying. You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever. How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless. Reserve list gives some kind of confidence, which is great to have. Personally I don't believe actual players are screwing the secondary market, but speculators and people only in it for the money. They are the issue, not the reserve list. We call this, welcome to capitalism.
I really don't get all the crying about the reserve list. Whether you like it or not it is important.
...
You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever.
To me, it's all about the experience of being able to play with some fun cards. Duals are great, yes. I'd happily splash that money to stick a full set of duals in my cube.
And yet, they're on the Reserved List. And here I am, with zero chances of these awesome cards ever being reprinted, all because someone, somewhere made a bad decision two decades ago and WotC continue to believe it was a good one. Those original duals are, in the end, 20yo pieces of cardboard... they're not going to last forever. Do you want to deny the community a heck of a lot more fun in a decade or so when all those duals have disintegrated?
How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless.
Then why don't WotC put valued Standard cards on the Reserved List?
They put the initial ones on the list to preserve their value, and yet that clearly doesn't bother them when it comes to putting cards like Boros Reckoner and Brimaz, King of Oreskos in it (cards that were over $20 a copy while in Standard, but have tanked to much less than that post-rotation).
Personally I don't believe actual players are screwing the secondary market, but speculators and people only in it for the money. They are the issue, not the reserve list. We call this, welcome to capitalism.
Now that I'm with you on - the rampant speculation by "MtG Finance" guys is definitely hurting the secondary market. While I don't think the Reserved List is the way to solve this, WotC definitely needs to be considering this issue, particularly with eternal formats that have high entry costs. Eternal Masters looks to be a step in the right direction for this. But maintaining that Reserved List simply gives the speculators a finite set of cards that they can effectively shut the average Magic-playing Joe out of. That's why it's a bad thing.
I really don't get all the crying about the reserve list. Whether you like it or not it is important. No one is going to buy a box of new cards if they were worthless. Anyone who says that just to play and have fun, with zero return on investment, is going to drop several hundred dollars on a every new set to play standard and not care its worthless is lying. You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever. How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless. Reserve list gives some kind of confidence, which is great to have. Personally I don't believe actual players are screwing the secondary market, but speculators and people only in it for the money. They are the issue, not the reserve list. We call this, welcome to capitalism.
Cards only have worth if people are playing the game. If legacy dies as a format, who is going to be buying all of those cards on the reserve list in the first place? Tarmogoyf has been reprinted two times in limited release and has retained its value just fine, because it's in a format that is supported due to the fact that it isn't hindered by the reserve list. Talking about confidence due to the reserve list is ridiculous. You can guarantee if Wizards made strictly better dual lands in a standard legal set, the price of duals would crash, reserve list or not. People who are pro-reserve list need a wake up call. Your cards have value because people play them. Not being able to reprint them just makes them ridiculously costed, and gives people less reason to play with them in the first place. You're actively killing the format that makes your cards worth money in the first place.
Regardless of the entire conversation. Wizards has stated time and time again that they refuse to get rid of the reserve list, and I don't see this changing anytime soon.
$10 a pack, okay. Sounds like they will sell quickly even at this high price.
My question is: What makes the cardboard rectangles and ink patterns in this pack worth three times as much as the cardboard rectangles and ink patterns in most other packs?
Is it because the ink patterns on these cardboard rectangles are similar to those on certain very valuable 20-year-old cards?
Why can't all packs be that way? Then they could ALL sell for $10 instead of $3.
Oh, there's a limit to how many of these ink patterns they can print?
Why is that?
Ohhh, because the secondary market would completely collapse and collectors would lose faith in the value of the game, if too many of these certain very valuable 20-year-old cards are printed?
A bit like how we can't just print a trillion dollars at the central bank and have prosperity for all? That would just cause hyperinflation and currency collapse?
What a nightmare for the secondary market. A massive win for Card Corp. Printing old power, we all knew it would happen eventually. Right before (or as) the secondary market collapses.
Nothing goes forever, not even awesome card games.
Wizards is "taking profits" as they say in the investing world. It's what investors do when they sense rough times coming.
You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever. How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless. Reserve list gives some kind of confidence, which is great to have.
The Reserved List gives the wrong kind of confidence, though. The dual lands are ultimately just some cardboard, and their value is defined entirely by their perception as the most powerful lands available in the formats they're legal in. Their demand is largely driven by their function as a part of the game. And yet the Reserved List is slowly but surely strangling the life from those formats, and eventually dual lands will tank in price as they're reduced to nothing but curios for collectors because nobody can possibly play Legacy. Vintage is basically already there; I'm sure you've heard that the "only way to get into Vintage is to know somebody in Vintage."
Now WotC is reaping what they've sown. They'll reprint a bunch of Legacy staples, but even if you open 4 Force of Wills (ha ha good joke) you're still so far away from a working deck because so much of the format is locked behind the Reserved List. This set won't do anything except make Edh players happy and annoy people who think they can make a profit from hording it.
I really don't get all the crying about the reserve list. Whether you like it or not it is important. No one is going to buy a box of new cards if they were worthless. Anyone who says that just to play and have fun, with zero return on investment, is going to drop several hundred dollars on a every new set to play standard and not care its worthless is lying. You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever. How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless. Reserve list gives some kind of confidence, which is great to have. Personally I don't believe actual players are screwing the secondary market, but speculators and people only in it for the money. They are the issue, not the reserve list. We call this, welcome to capitalism.
Cards only have worth if people are playing the game. If legacy dies as a format, who is going to be buying all of those cards on the reserve list in the first place? Tarmogoyf has been reprinted two times in limited release and has retained its value just fine, because it's in a format that is supported due to the fact that it isn't hindered by the reserve list. Talking about confidence due to the reserve list is ridiculous. You can guarantee if Wizards made strictly better dual lands in a standard legal set, the price of duals would crash, reserve list or not. People who are pro-reserve list need a wake up call. Your cards have value because people play them. Not being able to reprint them just makes them ridiculously costed, and gives people less reason to play with them in the first place. You're actively killing the format that makes your cards worth money in the first place.
Regardless of the entire conversation. Wizards has stated time and time again that they refuse to get rid of the reserve list, and I don't see this changing anytime soon.
Age, rarity and shear collect-ability also play a part in cost. History creates want, whether it be old coins or stamps or baseball cards. The game play adds to the value incredibly, but your based on play = value is kinda flawed. If price was based on quantity of people playing alone, power would be worthless. No one (unfortunately) plays vintage and you cant even use P9 in commander. Why isn't that stuff all worthless then? Age, rarity and some small 93/94 format...
I really don't get all the crying about the reserve list. Whether you like it or not it is important.
...
You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever.
To me, it's all about the experience of being able to play with some fun cards. Duals are great, yes. I'd happily splash that money to stick a full set of duals in my cube.
And yet, they're on the Reserved List. And here I am, with zero chances of these awesome cards ever being reprinted, all because someone, somewhere made a bad decision two decades ago and WotC continue to believe it was a good one. Those original duals are, in the end, 20yo pieces of cardboard... they're not going to last forever. Do you want to deny the community a heck of a lot more fun in a decade or so when all those duals have disintegrated?
How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless.
Then why don't WotC put valued Standard cards on the Reserved List?
They put the initial ones on the list to preserve their value, and yet that clearly doesn't bother them when it comes to putting cards like Boros Reckoner and Brimaz, King of Oreskos in it (cards that were over $20 a copy while in Standard, but have tanked to much less than that post-rotation).
Personally I don't believe actual players are screwing the secondary market, but speculators and people only in it for the money. They are the issue, not the reserve list. We call this, welcome to capitalism.
Now that I'm with you on - the rampant speculation by "MtG Finance" guys is definitely hurting the secondary market. While I don't think the Reserved List is the way to solve this, WotC definitely needs to be considering this issue, particularly with eternal formats that have high entry costs. Eternal Masters looks to be a step in the right direction for this. But maintaining that Reserved List simply gives the speculators a finite set of cards that they can effectively shut the average Magic-playing Joe out of. That's why it's a bad thing.
The problem with all this is that we can't stop the haves from buying up whatever they want. Look what happened to Jayemdae Tome, a worthless card reprinted a million times, originals skyrocketed just because people need it for 93/94. They all got bought out and went from $6 unlimited to almost $100. This kinda stuff will always happen. If they ditch the reserve list and say print a FTV Duals, which would be foil alt art and limited, anyone who can is just going to buy them up while stores will vastly overcharge for them. It is a never ending cycle. My whole issue is if you know something will get reprinted every time there is any kind of scarcity, when do they all become worthless? I go back to standard, anyone who has played standard for the last 10 years continuously has invested a lot more money than someone playing legacy that whole time.
My answer to the dual issue specifically is what I'm sure someone else has said. Print a Legendary Snow dual for each color combo. You can fetch that when you need mana now, fetch a shockland when its before your turn and you don't need it now. Sure real duals would be an upgrade but not that noticeable. I would love to see this happen for the sake of Legacy as a format.
Also just to be transparent here, I would love to have access to really expensive cards like Taberancle at Pendrall Vale, but because I cant trade for any I play a different deck. Not everyone can have every card. I think that adds to the fun and excitement of trading and playing this game.
You get a set of duals, say underground sea for a grand, and can play play with them forever. How many standard cards are worth money, rotate and never see play again becoming worthless. Reserve list gives some kind of confidence, which is great to have.
The Reserved List gives the wrong kind of confidence, though. The dual lands are ultimately just some cardboard, and their value is defined entirely by their perception as the most powerful lands available in the formats they're legal in. Their demand is largely driven by their function as a part of the game. And yet the Reserved List is slowly but surely strangling the life from those formats, and eventually dual lands will tank in price as they're reduced to nothing but curios for collectors because nobody can possibly play Legacy. Vintage is basically already there; I'm sure you've heard that the "only way to get into Vintage is to know somebody in Vintage."
Now WotC is reaping what they've sown. They'll reprint a bunch of Legacy staples, but even if you open 4 Force of Wills (ha ha good joke) you're still so far away from a working deck because so much of the format is locked behind the Reserved List. This set won't do anything except make Edh players happy and annoy people who think they can make a profit from hording it.
Speculators and Hoarders are in most cases not players. I still don't think reprinting everything ever solves the problem, it hasn't done much for our economy I can tell you that.
My answer to the dual scarcity issue specifically is what I'm sure someone else has said. Print a Legendary Snow dual for each color combo. You can fetch that when you need mana now, fetch a shockland when its before your turn and you don't need it now. Sure real duals would be an upgrade but not that noticeable. I would love to see this happen for the sake of Legacy as a format.
Perhaps it's time to finally settle the reserved list situation in literally the only reasonable way possible...
Ban all reserved list cards in Lagacy.
Either that, or introduce a third eternal format. And not a non-rotating format like Modern, but a truly eternal fotmat, in terms of both backwards set legality, and the legality of new supplemental product cards like Flusterstorm. And, of course, ban the reserved list.
I think the former makes more sense. Just relegate the reserved list to Vintage and Commander. That should pretty much even out the supply for those players. I just read the list again, and I really don't think it would be super impactful to ban it. Obviously every mana base shifts, and mono-red gets a natural boost from that, but most of the major archetypes stay fully intact. You lose only a small handful of relevant cards, but nothing irreplaceable apart from maybe LED. After everyone has a few months to cry wolf and whine about it, Wizards can pretty much wipe their hands of the whole debate. No one will care any more than they currently do about the lack of Black Lotus reprints....
I wonder how that would make players feel after spending thousands of dollars on Duals. If Duals get banned in legacy, I don't see a situation where the prices of Duals don't just absolutely tank, and people will lose out on a crap-ton of money. The only reason why Duals hold any value is because of their demand in Legacy. No one plays Vintage, so if you ban them in Legacy, they literally have no value. That would be ironic, for cards on the Reserved List to lose their value not due to reprints, but due to being banned in Legacy.
And Wizards would 100% be able to get away with it because they only made a promise to simply not reprint those cards. They never said anything about guaranteeing that those cards don't get banned in older formats.
TBH, it's probably just as well that they do this, IMO. Then Wizards can finally take back control of their game and reprint to their hearts content. This is good for them and the players in the long run.
People seem to forget you can play Khans fetches and Shocklands. Yes, it's not as good as ABUR duals, but it's a relatively cheaper way to get into Legacy without making the huge financial plunge. A number of students who play at the Legacy FNMs do just that and seem to still do fine (2-2 and 3-1).
Duals are overrated for the most part. I've done just fine without them. Shocks are okay and the new lands from BFZ are good too.
Let me just weigh in and tell you that this does not apply for every deck out there. I`m stupid enough to have chosen a deck that can just straight up die to a shock land, because those two life points can either cost me a Griselbrand activation or get me down to Bolt range after activating him. Many decks can be played just fine with shocks, but not all of them.
All this talk about a new "no RL Legacy" is nonsense. One article on Goldfish, and everyone suddenly sees it as inevitable. Let me tell you, my one and only Legacy deck would be unplayable, not just because of lacking duals, but also because Shallow Grave, a $5 RL card - not exactly prohibitively expensive, would be collateral damage. I also think that it would split the Legacy player base instead of straight up taking over Legacy completely. Two Legacy events a month in your hometown. Not as much as you`d like? Try one regular Legacy event and one no RL Legacy event per month, and let`s say that you, like me, would have to build a new deck for no RL Legacy. Sounds tempting? Didn`t think so. I`d rather see more unsanctioned 5/10-proxy events than WotC trying to tear Legacy apart and only half-way succeeding.
Let me just weigh in and tell you that this does not apply for every deck out there. I`m stupid enough to have chosen a deck that can just straight up die to a shock land, because those two life points can either cost me a Griselbrand activation or get me down to Bolt range after activating him. Many decks can be played just fine with shocks, but not all of them.
All this talk about a new "no RL Legacy" is nonsense. One article on Goldfish, and everyone suddenly sees it as inevitable. Let me tell you, my one and only Legacy deck would be unplayable, not just because of lacking duals, but also because Shallow Grave, a $5 RL card - not exactly prohibitively expensive, would be collateral damage. I also think that it would split the Legacy player base instead of straight up taking over Legacy completely. Two Legacy events a month in your hometown. Not as much as you`d like? Try one regular Legacy event and one no RL Legacy event per month, and let`s say that you, like me, would have to build a new deck for no RL Legacy. Sounds tempting? Didn`t think so. I`d rather see more unsanctioned 5/10-proxy events than WotC trying to tear Legacy apart and only half-way succeeding.
You're not taking into consideration (or didn't mention) the influx of players who won't play Vintage/Legacy but will play "Unreserved" (What I'm calling a hypothetical Eternal Format with no RL cards). If Modern is any indicator, there are actually a lot of players willing to jump into a format promised with accessibility (Reminder that the accessibility =/= affordability, accessibility is truly determined by the movement of cards in the Secondary Market), because they are willing to take the monetary "risks" involved to play a non-rotating/eternal format that can ensure an inflow of players due to said accessibility.
There is no way short of removing the RL to "save" Legacy while retaining its current play-state/meta-game. Since WotC have repeatedly reinforced that the List is staying, the format as it is, is pretty much "doomed". Yes, if Wizards wants to create and support an "accessible" Eternal format, "Unreserved" is pretty much their only option now. It may tear apart Legacy (and potentially vanquish it if the influx I stated does come in), but it's not like it can stop a group of Legacy players from assembling together for Unsanctioned proxy games anyway.
Legacy has reached a point that it can no longer "grow", except by unsanctioned proxy games (which is what I think your perspective as a player is trying to convey), but it's not in WotC's benefit for that sort of format to grow, since they can't control the entire market of the format, unlike with every other higher-than-FNM sanctioned format.
On the topic of Eternal Masters, I'm going to take a skeptical stance on it. Since the Limited Print Runs are confirmed, it can only go two ways:
1) Full of unwanted chaff in the set, leading to complaints about cards not being reprinted and packs being not worth it.
2) Fantasy Reprint-land achieved, which results in boosters doubling/tripling in price, leading to complains about pack prices (and a extra serving of a few more valuable cards not being reprinted, because its obvious they can't (and won't) print them all in 1 set anyway).
Reminder that Fantasy Reprint-Land with prices to ensure every pack is worth at least MSRP in the Secondary Market is never going to happen. So, pick your poison.
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Believe it or not I REALLY want Tragic Poet to be in this as a common in the new border too.
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
Really depends on whether or not people use this as an excuse to start buying into legacy or not. If they do, Force may skyrocket. But the duals are such a hindrance, it very well may tank the price. I'm rather curious to see which way it turns.
That's a rather specific card. It does have pretty art though, never seen it before.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
But really, why be irritated? They made a product you can't afford a bunch of other people can. I see nothing wrong with that. And if you think this is greedy, you should see most other game companies I see.
WUBRGPauper Battle BoxWUBRG ... and why I am not a fan of Wayne Reynolds' Illustrations.
Is it too much to ask nowadays, as a consumer, that a company make the products you want affordable? Especially given that said products are only expensive due to artificial scarcity; premium Magic products don't require more resources/labor to manufacture unlike other goods. Force of Will is just as easy to print as Kitesail Scout.
Hopefully this set prints other things such as Sensei's Divining Top, Stoneforge Mystic (the leaker mentioned this), Umezawa's Jitte, lots of pieces for Death and Taxes (none of it is on the reserved list), etc. I have my doubts given previous MM products (where there was just a bit of value and nothing in uncommon), but one can hope that it will drive up Legacy interest and give a path to getting into the format I (and many others) love.
My Trade Thread
Current Decks:
Legacy:
GWR Punishing Maverick
UW Miracles
UR Sneak and Show
GWB Enchantress
1) Not an autocorrect...just didn't know if MTGS was OK with using that word or not. Besides, we penguins are expected to do things with panache.
2) Like someone later said, artificial scarcity. It's like that annying fisherman in the commericals that say "Ooh, you almost had it". I'd rather punch the fisherman and get the prize.
Owner of IcyGeek.com
Yeah... I'd rather just walk away because it wasn't mine in the first place.
WUBRGPauper Battle BoxWUBRG ... and why I am not a fan of Wayne Reynolds' Illustrations.
To me, it's all about the experience of being able to play with some fun cards. Duals are great, yes. I'd happily splash that money to stick a full set of duals in my cube.
And yet, they're on the Reserved List. And here I am, with zero chances of these awesome cards ever being reprinted, all because someone, somewhere made a bad decision two decades ago and WotC continue to believe it was a good one. Those original duals are, in the end, 20yo pieces of cardboard... they're not going to last forever. Do you want to deny the community a heck of a lot more fun in a decade or so when all those duals have disintegrated?
Then why don't WotC put valued Standard cards on the Reserved List?
They put the initial ones on the list to preserve their value, and yet that clearly doesn't bother them when it comes to putting cards like Boros Reckoner and Brimaz, King of Oreskos in it (cards that were over $20 a copy while in Standard, but have tanked to much less than that post-rotation).
Now that I'm with you on - the rampant speculation by "MtG Finance" guys is definitely hurting the secondary market. While I don't think the Reserved List is the way to solve this, WotC definitely needs to be considering this issue, particularly with eternal formats that have high entry costs. Eternal Masters looks to be a step in the right direction for this. But maintaining that Reserved List simply gives the speculators a finite set of cards that they can effectively shut the average Magic-playing Joe out of. That's why it's a bad thing.
My Stupidly Large Number of Current Decks
PucaTrade with me!
The Multiplayer Power Rankings
Cube: the Gittening (My Multiplayer Cube) - MTGS Cube List | @ CubeTutor
The N00b Cube (Peasant cube for new players) - MTGS Cube List | @ CubeTutor
Regardless of the entire conversation. Wizards has stated time and time again that they refuse to get rid of the reserve list, and I don't see this changing anytime soon.
Commander
U Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive
RG Zilortha, Strength Incarnate
WB Amalia Benavides Aguirre
My question is: What makes the cardboard rectangles and ink patterns in this pack worth three times as much as the cardboard rectangles and ink patterns in most other packs?
Is it because the ink patterns on these cardboard rectangles are similar to those on certain very valuable 20-year-old cards?
Why can't all packs be that way? Then they could ALL sell for $10 instead of $3.
Oh, there's a limit to how many of these ink patterns they can print?
Why is that?
Ohhh, because the secondary market would completely collapse and collectors would lose faith in the value of the game, if too many of these certain very valuable 20-year-old cards are printed?
A bit like how we can't just print a trillion dollars at the central bank and have prosperity for all? That would just cause hyperinflation and currency collapse?
What a nightmare for the secondary market. A massive win for Card Corp. Printing old power, we all knew it would happen eventually. Right before (or as) the secondary market collapses.
Nothing goes forever, not even awesome card games.
Wizards is "taking profits" as they say in the investing world. It's what investors do when they sense rough times coming.
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Now WotC is reaping what they've sown. They'll reprint a bunch of Legacy staples, but even if you open 4 Force of Wills (ha ha good joke) you're still so far away from a working deck because so much of the format is locked behind the Reserved List. This set won't do anything except make Edh players happy and annoy people who think they can make a profit from hording it.
Age, rarity and shear collect-ability also play a part in cost. History creates want, whether it be old coins or stamps or baseball cards. The game play adds to the value incredibly, but your based on play = value is kinda flawed. If price was based on quantity of people playing alone, power would be worthless. No one (unfortunately) plays vintage and you cant even use P9 in commander. Why isn't that stuff all worthless then? Age, rarity and some small 93/94 format...
The problem with all this is that we can't stop the haves from buying up whatever they want. Look what happened to Jayemdae Tome, a worthless card reprinted a million times, originals skyrocketed just because people need it for 93/94. They all got bought out and went from $6 unlimited to almost $100. This kinda stuff will always happen. If they ditch the reserve list and say print a FTV Duals, which would be foil alt art and limited, anyone who can is just going to buy them up while stores will vastly overcharge for them. It is a never ending cycle. My whole issue is if you know something will get reprinted every time there is any kind of scarcity, when do they all become worthless? I go back to standard, anyone who has played standard for the last 10 years continuously has invested a lot more money than someone playing legacy that whole time.
My answer to the dual issue specifically is what I'm sure someone else has said. Print a Legendary Snow dual for each color combo. You can fetch that when you need mana now, fetch a shockland when its before your turn and you don't need it now. Sure real duals would be an upgrade but not that noticeable. I would love to see this happen for the sake of Legacy as a format.
Also just to be transparent here, I would love to have access to really expensive cards like Taberancle at Pendrall Vale, but because I cant trade for any I play a different deck. Not everyone can have every card. I think that adds to the fun and excitement of trading and playing this game.
Speculators and Hoarders are in most cases not players. I still don't think reprinting everything ever solves the problem, it hasn't done much for our economy I can tell you that.
My answer to the dual scarcity issue specifically is what I'm sure someone else has said. Print a Legendary Snow dual for each color combo. You can fetch that when you need mana now, fetch a shockland when its before your turn and you don't need it now. Sure real duals would be an upgrade but not that noticeable. I would love to see this happen for the sake of Legacy as a format.
I wonder how that would make players feel after spending thousands of dollars on Duals. If Duals get banned in legacy, I don't see a situation where the prices of Duals don't just absolutely tank, and people will lose out on a crap-ton of money. The only reason why Duals hold any value is because of their demand in Legacy. No one plays Vintage, so if you ban them in Legacy, they literally have no value. That would be ironic, for cards on the Reserved List to lose their value not due to reprints, but due to being banned in Legacy.
And Wizards would 100% be able to get away with it because they only made a promise to simply not reprint those cards. They never said anything about guaranteeing that those cards don't get banned in older formats.
TBH, it's probably just as well that they do this, IMO. Then Wizards can finally take back control of their game and reprint to their hearts content. This is good for them and the players in the long run.
The reason it's mythic is because it was meant as a cash grab. Let's not fool ourselves or believe whatever the angels at WotC tell you.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
Let me just weigh in and tell you that this does not apply for every deck out there. I`m stupid enough to have chosen a deck that can just straight up die to a shock land, because those two life points can either cost me a Griselbrand activation or get me down to Bolt range after activating him. Many decks can be played just fine with shocks, but not all of them.
All this talk about a new "no RL Legacy" is nonsense. One article on Goldfish, and everyone suddenly sees it as inevitable. Let me tell you, my one and only Legacy deck would be unplayable, not just because of lacking duals, but also because Shallow Grave, a $5 RL card - not exactly prohibitively expensive, would be collateral damage. I also think that it would split the Legacy player base instead of straight up taking over Legacy completely. Two Legacy events a month in your hometown. Not as much as you`d like? Try one regular Legacy event and one no RL Legacy event per month, and let`s say that you, like me, would have to build a new deck for no RL Legacy. Sounds tempting? Didn`t think so. I`d rather see more unsanctioned 5/10-proxy events than WotC trying to tear Legacy apart and only half-way succeeding.
Stay reasonable, be mindful of your expectations and don't feed the trolls.
Doomsdayin'
You're not taking into consideration (or didn't mention) the influx of players who won't play Vintage/Legacy but will play "Unreserved" (What I'm calling a hypothetical Eternal Format with no RL cards). If Modern is any indicator, there are actually a lot of players willing to jump into a format promised with accessibility (Reminder that the accessibility =/= affordability, accessibility is truly determined by the movement of cards in the Secondary Market), because they are willing to take the monetary "risks" involved to play a non-rotating/eternal format that can ensure an inflow of players due to said accessibility.
There is no way short of removing the RL to "save" Legacy while retaining its current play-state/meta-game. Since WotC have repeatedly reinforced that the List is staying, the format as it is, is pretty much "doomed". Yes, if Wizards wants to create and support an "accessible" Eternal format, "Unreserved" is pretty much their only option now. It may tear apart Legacy (and potentially vanquish it if the influx I stated does come in), but it's not like it can stop a group of Legacy players from assembling together for Unsanctioned proxy games anyway.
Legacy has reached a point that it can no longer "grow", except by unsanctioned proxy games (which is what I think your perspective as a player is trying to convey), but it's not in WotC's benefit for that sort of format to grow, since they can't control the entire market of the format, unlike with every other higher-than-FNM sanctioned format.
On the topic of Eternal Masters, I'm going to take a skeptical stance on it. Since the Limited Print Runs are confirmed, it can only go two ways:
1) Full of unwanted chaff in the set, leading to complaints about cards not being reprinted and packs being not worth it.
2) Fantasy Reprint-land achieved, which results in boosters doubling/tripling in price, leading to complains about pack prices (and a extra serving of a few more valuable cards not being reprinted, because its obvious they can't (and won't) print them all in 1 set anyway).
Reminder that Fantasy Reprint-Land with prices to ensure every pack is worth at least MSRP in the Secondary Market is never going to happen. So, pick your poison.