As for a 2 vs 5 thing, do you know how much money WOTC isn't getting from precon collectors like me? They are missing out on $45 because I will now probably buy 3 less precons per set.
There probably aren't really that many "precon collectors like you." Think of it this way- literally all "people like you" will auto-buy these. Great for WotC. MOST people don't buy ANY intro pack trash, but SO MANY people will probably buy one or probably BOTH of these because of exclusive stuff. Sure they lose ~1 point from you folks, but get +100 points from everyone else. This is intuitively obvious to even the most casual observer.
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My favorite flavor text: Time of Heroes
Feel free to tell me yours!
As for a 2 vs 5 thing, do you know how much money WOTC isn't getting from precon collectors like me? They are missing out on $45 because I will now probably buy 3 less precons per set.
There probably aren't really that many "precon collectors like you." Think of it this way- literally all "people like you" will auto-buy these. Great for WotC. MOST people don't buy ANY intro pack trash, but SO MANY people will probably buy one or probably BOTH of these because of exclusive stuff. Sure they lose ~1 point from you folks, but get +100 points from everyone else. This is intuitively obvious to even the most casual observer.
I'm not arguing about the contents. I am arguing about the fact that there are 2 instead of 4 or 5 per set. If there are 4 or 5 and they are as good as the planeswalkers decks claim to be, that means more sales for wotc as 4 or 5 decks per set means more matchups than 2 decks per set.
The planeswalkers are said to be too costly and splashy to make any sort of impact in standard. These are probably for the kitchen table - even though they're gonna be standard legal like the origins legal cards that didn't appear in boosters. It seems interesting. Hopefully the price tag means that if I want to add any of them in my superfriends deck or decide to make a superfriends cube then it should be all the more interesting, at least.
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Another gripe about the 2 choices vs 4 or 5 choices and this has to do with what theme decks had that intro packs didn't. Each theme deck came with its own strategy insert, exclusive to that deck, and not some general insert that contains the decklists of all 5 decks right? Each of the theme deck inserts had a general storyline blurb that all 4 theme decks in the set had, and each theme deck also had a specific storyline blurb on the strategy insert. Let's take Fifth Dawn for example. One blurb talks about resourceful humans, another one talks about the Mephidross and what it does to the populace, the third one talks about the tangle and its denizens, and the fourth one talks about the 5 suns. When I bought theme decks, and when I chose a deck, it felt like I was choosing an allegiance, something that Planar Chaos theme decks and beyond took away. With 2 of 5 choices, I feel like they are missing out on the "I am choosing this specific allegiance" feeling that I used to have when I buy a theme deck. Yeah, I may be able to choose 2 of them, but it just so happens that this allegiance happens to be on the same side as a planeswalker, and in no way can I choose to be on the team without a planewalker, unless I built my own deck of course.
It's either you are on team A or team B, even though the story also has team C, team D, and team E, while in the second set of the block, you can only be team F or team G, even if there is also team H, team I, and team J. The best example is with the Ravnica guilds and how 2 decks per set can fit with 10 guilds if WOTC decides to return there for a third time.
Not to mention that you can "explore" the themes and mechanics of the set if they don't make a deck for each theme and mechanic, and I highly doubt that each set has 2 or less themes and mechanics.
Another gripe about the 2 choices vs 4 or 5 choices and this has to do with what theme decks had that intro packs didn't. Each theme deck came with its own strategy insert, exclusive to that deck, and not some general insert that contains the decklists of all 5 decks right? Each of the theme deck inserts had a general storyline blurb that all 4 theme decks in the set had, and each theme deck also had a specific storyline blurb on the strategy insert. Let's take Fifth Dawn for example. One blurb talks about resourceful humans, another one talks about the Mephidross and what it does to the populace, the third one talks about the tangle and its denizens, and the fourth one talks about the 5 suns. When I bought theme decks, and when I chose a deck, it felt like I was choosing an allegiance, something that Planar Chaos theme decks and beyond took away. With 2 of 5 choices, I feel like they are missing out on the "I am choosing this specific allegiance" feeling that I used to have when I buy a theme deck. Yeah, I may be able to choose 2 of them, but it just so happens that this allegiance happens to be on the same side as a planeswalker, and in no way can I choose to be on the team without a planewalker, unless I built my own deck of course.
It's either you are on team A or team B, even though the story also has team C, team D, and team E, while in the second set of the block, you can only be team F or team G, even if there is also team H, team I, and team J. The best example is with the Ravnica guilds and how 2 decks per set can fit with 10 guilds if WOTC decides to return there for a third time.
Not to mention that you can "explore" the themes and mechanics of the set if they don't make a deck for each theme and mechanic, and I highly doubt that each set has 2 or less themes and mechanics.
It's actually pretty heartwarming to see someone actually care about intro packs and their contents, the deck identity, mechanics, and variety. You must realize that you are a rarity among magic players though. Too few people actually give a darn about everything you mentioned. Planeswalkers are so much hotter, and so IN YOUR FACE. Planeswalkers are so hyped every set, but many new players don't get to open these cool characters. Now they do. It's a better intro pack experience overall. Don't worry though- I expect many years of cool stuff like this years' products going forward. You still have so much cool and unique stuff to collect
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My favorite flavor text: Time of Heroes
Feel free to tell me yours!
Another gripe about the 2 choices vs 4 or 5 choices and this has to do with what theme decks had that intro packs didn't. Each theme deck came with its own strategy insert, exclusive to that deck, and not some general insert that contains the decklists of all 5 decks right? Each of the theme deck inserts had a general storyline blurb that all 4 theme decks in the set had, and each theme deck also had a specific storyline blurb on the strategy insert. Let's take Fifth Dawn for example. One blurb talks about resourceful humans, another one talks about the Mephidross and what it does to the populace, the third one talks about the tangle and its denizens, and the fourth one talks about the 5 suns. When I bought theme decks, and when I chose a deck, it felt like I was choosing an allegiance, something that Planar Chaos theme decks and beyond took away. With 2 of 5 choices, I feel like they are missing out on the "I am choosing this specific allegiance" feeling that I used to have when I buy a theme deck. Yeah, I may be able to choose 2 of them, but it just so happens that this allegiance happens to be on the same side as a planeswalker, and in no way can I choose to be on the team without a planewalker, unless I built my own deck of course.
It's either you are on team A or team B, even though the story also has team C, team D, and team E, while in the second set of the block, you can only be team F or team G, even if there is also team H, team I, and team J. The best example is with the Ravnica guilds and how 2 decks per set can fit with 10 guilds if WOTC decides to return there for a third time.
Not to mention that you can "explore" the themes and mechanics of the set if they don't make a deck for each theme and mechanic, and I highly doubt that each set has 2 or less themes and mechanics.
Last theme deck i bought was The RG from Shadowmore And although it had All Deck lists in them They also had THE how to play and improvements in a short text, Had the Book Story blurb too.
I know that theme decks Had the strategy insert With THE blurb of the theme of the deck ( UB deck from invasion Had a litle story of the horors of Phyrexia While the WUBRG One was all about the Forces of the coalision and its forces for exemple ) and Man i miss those stories i remenber spending 10 minutes reading and reading again almost all of the Kamigawa one, one with the story of seishiro and how he was rased by the monks, the other, If i remenber well Had a blurb on Inname and the White one Had a more in Deph of the eiganjo vs the Kami... It was really apealing. But they have not discontinued them. They are still there but smaler, and Now We have the UNchanted Realms and other flavors... For exemple: part of the story of the 2 Rangers that were hunting a werewolf that apeared To be in the town Cold easily be the blurb for the GU deck, part of the story asking Olivia for help could be the BR Vampires intro deck blurb. The story about Thalia and Odric could be the UW blurb The Girtrog one for the BG deliriun one.
And This aplies to Each colection that has Had the UR articles for them.
But all in all if You like the old Theme decks then commander decks are for you .
On a sidenote the article says those New introwalkers decks will try to be more focused on the theme of the colection Soo At least they i think they wIll try to push New mwchanics on them and maybe i Can play them againt casual decks again
Another gripe about the 2 choices vs 4 or 5 choices and this has to do with what theme decks had that intro packs didn't. Each theme deck came with its own strategy insert, exclusive to that deck, and not some general insert that contains the decklists of all 5 decks right? Each of the theme deck inserts had a general storyline blurb that all 4 theme decks in the set had, and each theme deck also had a specific storyline blurb on the strategy insert. Let's take Fifth Dawn for example. One blurb talks about resourceful humans, another one talks about the Mephidross and what it does to the populace, the third one talks about the tangle and its denizens, and the fourth one talks about the 5 suns. When I bought theme decks, and when I chose a deck, it felt like I was choosing an allegiance, something that Planar Chaos theme decks and beyond took away. With 2 of 5 choices, I feel like they are missing out on the "I am choosing this specific allegiance" feeling that I used to have when I buy a theme deck. Yeah, I may be able to choose 2 of them, but it just so happens that this allegiance happens to be on the same side as a planeswalker, and in no way can I choose to be on the team without a planewalker, unless I built my own deck of course.
It's either you are on team A or team B, even though the story also has team C, team D, and team E, while in the second set of the block, you can only be team F or team G, even if there is also team H, team I, and team J. The best example is with the Ravnica guilds and how 2 decks per set can fit with 10 guilds if WOTC decides to return there for a third time.
Not to mention that you can "explore" the themes and mechanics of the set if they don't make a deck for each theme and mechanic, and I highly doubt that each set has 2 or less themes and mechanics.
Last theme deck i bought was The RG from Shadowmore And although it had All Deck lists in them They also had THE how to play and improvements in a short text, Had the Book Story blurb too.
I know that theme decks Had the strategy insert With THE blurb of the theme of the deck ( UB deck from invasion Had a litle story of the horors of Phyrexia While the WUBRG One was all about the Forces of the coalision and its forces for exemple ) and Man i miss those stories i remenber spending 10 minutes reading and reading again almost all of the Kamigawa one, one with the story of seishiro and how he was rased by the monks, the other, If i remenber well Had a blurb on Inname and the White one Had a more in Deph of the eiganjo vs the Kami... It was really apealing. But they have not discontinued them. They are still there but smaler, and Now We have the UNchanted Realms and other flavors... For exemple: part of the story of the 2 Rangers that were hunting a werewolf that apeared To be in the town Cold easily be the blurb for the GU deck, part of the story asking Olivia for help could be the BR Vampires intro deck blurb. The story about Thalia and Odric could be the UW blurb The Girtrog one for the BG deliriun one.
And This aplies to Each colection that has Had the UR articles for them.
But all in all if You like the old Theme decks then commander decks are for you .
On a sidenote the article says those New introwalkers decks will try to be more focused on the theme of the colection Soo At least they i think they wIll try to push New mwchanics on them and maybe i Can play them againt casual decks again
For me the $34.99 price tag is a turn off, which is why I like intro packs even though they suck. If only there were 4 planeswalker decks or 2 planeswalker decks for $14.99 and 3 regular non-planeswalkers decks for a cheaper price like $11.99. 4 decks a block cannot show players all the themes and mechanics of the block, and a lot of veteran players are steering new players away from the joys of set exploration because intro packs can't beat the average constructed deck, nor can you sell the contents to break even.
I don't like product reviewers who say that a product sucks because they can't break even or make a profit by selling the cards. Theme decks for $10 was worth it because I used them a lot of times. Sure I wouldn't have made a profit by selling the cards but the value comes from using the deck.
Theme decks and intro packs for me allow me to get a feel for the set without totally investing too much into the game but I guess WOTC wants people to unload their wallet into their stuff. Why else would they include one more booster in the fat pack? That's an excuse for a price hike.
The quantity of set associated precons allow for more matchups, especially when I play with people who aren't into magic, I could lend them one of my 300+ theme decks or intro packs and use them. That is the value I find with the lowly intro pack.
Back, again with the 2 vs 5 thing. With 2 decks per set, it is nothing more than the same problem I had with duel decks and Event Decks. Duel decks was just Deck A vs Deck B. Intro packs were Deck A vs Deck B, Deck A vs Deck C, Deck D vs Deck E, and 7 other different matchups, provided you don't match up against the same deck. Duel Decks came about because they wanted to make a flavor based precon, but because they already have a flavor based duel deck, they just took all the flavor away from the theme decks when they became intro packs. There is flavor in them, except that you have to imagine it very hard. All I ask for is for the flavor to return to the set associated precon, which is happening with the planeswalker deck, but here is a new problem. You are only capturing some of the flavor because of the 2 instead of 5 decks per set thing.
It's actually pretty heartwarming to see someone actually care about intro packs and their contents, the deck identity, mechanics, and variety. You must realize that you are a rarity among magic players though. Too few people actually give a darn about everything you mentioned. Planeswalkers are so much hotter, and so IN YOUR FACE. Planeswalkers are so hyped every set, but many new players don't get to open these cool characters. Now they do. It's a better intro pack experience overall. Don't worry though- I expect many years of cool stuff like this years' products going forward. You still have so much cool and unique stuff to collect
I am arguing for 5 instead of 2, not the fact that the contents of an intro pack became the contents of a planeswalker deck. I could care less for that. All I ask for is for 5 choices per set. As a side effect of the change to planewalker deck, we will be seeing the same planeswalker mug every 2 or 3 sets instead of having a variety of cool creatures as the cover card.
Imagine that people get to play with cool planewalkers. Imagine that they had 5 to choose from, instead of 2. As I said, one person would more likely buy the entire set of 5, but now 3 sales are lost because they already completed the set at 2, especially now that they have planeswalkers in them. I should really say that each person would most likely buy at most 2 decks, and the potential up to $45 is lost. It is even less likely for one person to buy more than one of the same precon. Even with 2 choices, I highly doubt anyone would buy one and completely ignore the other one, especially with each deck at $14.99.
What I would like to see is for large set to have 5 planeswalker decks, and for the small set to have the run of the mill theme deck, but the theme deck will have some blurb on how to combine the deck with the planeswalker deck from the large set. You remember Clash Packs right? Remember how they have 2 decks, both with completely different mechanical themes, for example Origins, one was about Renown, the other was about Bolster and Outlast, and how you could combine them into one mega deck? Remember how intro packs are color coded White, Blue, Black, Red, Green? The Planeswalker decks for large sets and run of the mill theme decks for small sets, all come in sets of 5, and are color coded like intro packs, and the idea here is that the theme deck, let's say the one packaged in Red, will have a blurb and combined decklist for a combined Red Planeswalker deck and Red theme deck, and the themes and mechanics of the Red Theme Deck work well with the Red Planeswalker deck. That is how it should have been. The precon from the small set supplementing the precon from the large set. The decks separately would have its own story based flavor, but the combined decks would not have any story based flavor, but instead enhance the experience of combining 2 mechanical themes, much like what Clash Packs used to do. With 1 mythic and 4 rares (I assume 2 exclusive rares and 2 set specific rares) from the planewalker deck, and 2 more rares from the theme deck, that makes 7 rares, which what the first few event decks had. Combining the 2 decks would essentially give you a block constructed event deck, although you would have to wait for the small set to come out to achieve that. Ideally, I would like the Planeswalker deck to have 1 mythic, 2 exclusive rares, and 3 set specific rares, while the theme deck having only 4 set specific rares. Combining them would equate to your typical 10 rare event deck. This is one way to have 10 decks per block, without having to have 10 planeswalkers per block. One block already has 4 planewalker decks anyway, so adding one more, placing them all in the first set of the block, and having 5 decks with no planewalkers in them that supplement the planeswalker deck in the first set is a better idea, and more sales because people are more likely want to buy all 5 planewalkers, as well as the 5 supplemental theme decks from the small set because they have the potential to change the Planeswalker deck into an event deck. Note that each deck separately is still a functional deck, and isn't half a deck that doesn't work on its own. It is exactly like the clash pack decks separated.
1. Planeswalkers are in the deck.
2. All the themes and mechanics are covered
3. Event decks, although block constructed, are back. Ok, they are whatever the combined clash pack decks would be.
All I ask for is for 5 choices per set. As a side effect of the change to planewalker deck, we will be seeing the same planeswalker mug every 2 or 3 sets instead of having a variety of cool creatures as the cover card.
I understand what appeals to you, but I have no doubt that this is as much of a reaction to sales as it is a creative decision. I guarantee that if intro packs sold well they would not have been dropped. I know that LGS could not care less about them, and I see leftover intro decks from previous sets on the racks at big box stores long after the next set has come out.
Imagine that people get to play with cool planewalkers. Imagine that they had 5 to choose from, instead of 2.
imagine that WotC runs out of PW design space twice as quickly (if you are talking about per set). Wizards doesn't want 5 for them to choose from, they want to two that will get bought. The other three are just waste. Having 2/set means that people are much more likely to buy 100% of this product each set, and they don't have to put money into producing a product that so many players ignore and let gather dust on shelves.
As I said, one person would more likely buy the entire set of 5, but now 3 sales are lost because they already completed the set at 2..
No, because most people (who look at this kind of product) will still only buy two no matter how many choices they have. The others would just sit on shelves. I will grant you that 5 PW decks would draw more people to buy for a bit, but as soon as WotC proved that these walkers were not going anywhere near competitive play the sales would drop off again. Very few people are going to spend the $45 extra dollars to get 3 more decks that are aimed at players who are transitioning from Duels or the free decks regardless if they have Timmy walkers in them or not. The threshold for how much the target audience is willing to spend on low level product is finite, and printing 5 choices just makes for more waste.
Besides, psychology has shown that as much as people think they want more choices, they are actually more satisfied with the choice they make if they are given fewer options to choose from.
^ Well said, but I definitely see planeswalker design space being an issue in 5 vs 2. They also feel a bit more special when there are fewer. "Oh, what two are we getting this block?" vs, "Okay, so are we getting any new PW's this time or..."
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My favorite flavor text: Time of Heroes
Feel free to tell me yours!
All I ask for is for 5 choices per set. As a side effect of the change to planewalker deck, we will be seeing the same planeswalker mug every 2 or 3 sets instead of having a variety of cool creatures as the cover card.
I understand what appeals to you, but I have no doubt that this is as much of a reaction to sales as it is a creative decision. I guarantee that if intro packs sold well they would not have been dropped. I know that LGS could not care less about them, and I see leftover intro decks from previous sets on the racks at big box stores long after the next set has come out.
Imagine that people get to play with cool planewalkers. Imagine that they had 5 to choose from, instead of 2.
imagine that WotC runs out of PW design space twice as quickly (if you are talking about per set). Wizards doesn't want 5 for them to choose from, they want to two that will get bought. The other three are just waste. Having 2/set means that people are much more likely to buy 100% of this product each set, and they don't have to put money into producing a product that so many players ignore and let gather dust on shelves.
As I said, one person would more likely buy the entire set of 5, but now 3 sales are lost because they already completed the set at 2..
No, because most people (who look at this kind of product) will still only buy two no matter how many choices they have. The others would just sit on shelves. I will grant you that 5 PW decks would draw more people to buy for a bit, but as soon as WotC proved that these walkers were not going anywhere near competitive play the sales would drop off again. Very few people are going to spend the $45 extra dollars to get 3 more decks that are aimed at players who are transitioning from Duels or the free decks regardless if they have Timmy walkers in them or not. The threshold for how much the target audience is willing to spend on low level product is finite, and printing 5 choices just makes for more waste.
Besides, psychology has shown that as much as people think they want more choices, they are actually more satisfied with the choice they make if they are given fewer options to choose from.
You are saying that all themes and mechanics in a set shouldn't be covered, and that there should be less CHOICE for people to choose from. Have you seen every player in your store choose the same 2 intro packs, leaving the other 3 to collect dust, or do some player prefer intro pack 1 and intro pack 2, while another might prefer intro pack 3 and intro pack 5? As for pw design space. If you read my suggestion, they could release 5 pw decks only in large sets, and in the small sets, release 5 theme decks that are designed to combine with the pw decks from the previous set. There you have planeswalkers, 5 per block, more themes to CHOOSE from, and a potential block constructed worthy deck.
The planeswalkers are said to be too costly and splashy to make any sort of impact in standard. These are probably for the kitchen table - even though they're gonna be standard legal like the origins legal cards that didn't appear in boosters. It seems interesting. Hopefully the price tag means that if I want to add any of them in my superfriends deck or decide to make a superfriends cube then it should be all the more interesting, at least.
Big and Splashy.. Precisely what defines a fun card for me in Commander. These walkers will probably be used almost exclusively in EDH decks, since the effects will not be good enough or the cost too high for standard/eternal formats. I really hope they realize this and take a look at the Duel Deck series and print these walkers as foils to make all the shiny Commander pimps like me happy
Wizards is so hellbent on burning money it makes me cry.
It's unending angry defiance to take heed from other companies that are doing MTGO but better on levels that MTG Players could only DREAM OF is being kicked to the curb, replaced by..
PLANESWALKER 2ND LEVEL INTRO PACKS!
Just.. Just imagine this with me for a minute
Code Cards: Everything you buy in Paper has a code that can be redeemed online, booster packs or tickets or something.
Daily Reward: Every day you log in, you get a reward like a booster pack or an entry into a tournament.
Daily Challenge: Play a 'Color or Color Combination' of the Day Format. Can be in any kind of Format like Pauper, EDH, Legacy, Vintage, Standard, etc. Completing the challenge awards packs or tickets.
Special Challenge: Sometimes your challenge is a bit more specific, like "Win the game at 30+ life" and the rewards are better!
Tutorial Rewards: The new mechanic in SOI is 'Madness'! Beat the CPU with a deck containing at least 10 Madness cards!
How cool does all that sound? It really makes Magic an interactive experience. ...Now check this out. Pokemon has been doing it for like. EVER.
The Pokémon Trading Card Game Online is an awesome way to play the Pokémon Trading Card Game on the go against players around the world. And with a variety of rewards and bonuses you can earn, there's much more to playing than simply the thrill of competition! Take a look at all of the opportunities for you to earn rewards and bonuses in the Pokémon TCG Online.
Single-Player Rewards
Code Cards
One of the best ways to add new cards to your Pokémon TCG Online collection begins before you even begin playing. Nearly every Pokémon TCG product you can buy in a store comes with a code card that unlocks in-game items like booster packs and promo cards. You don't have to choose whether to purchase physical cards or digital cards—with these code cards, you get both!
Daily Bonus
When you sign in to the Pokémon TCG Online, one of the first things you'll see is the Daily Bonus. Just click on the bouncing Poké Ball every day to claim rewards including Trainer Tokens, Tournament Tickets, and booster packs. New players get even larger rewards during their first 3 days.
Daily & Special Challenges
Players are offered one new Daily Challenge per day, each associated with a particular Energy type. Complete these challenges to earn rewards such as Trainer Tokens or booster packs and to gain experience for that challenge's Energy type. You can level up in an Energy type by completing these challenges, and when you do, you'll earn additional promo rewards such as Energy-specific coins, card sleeves, and deck boxes. When you first begin to play the Pokémon TCG Online, you can have only one Daily Challenge active at a time. As you advance in level, you can work on completing up to three Daily Challenges simultaneously.
Sometimes, a limited-time Special Challenge will appear! Special Challenges tend to be more difficult than Daily Challenges and offer even greater rewards for completion. These rewards can include booster packs, promo items, Trainer Tokens, and Reward Chests (both Uncommon and Rare Holo).
Tutorial Rewards
If you are new to the Pokémon Trading Card Game, the online tutorial is an awesome way to learn how to play. What's more, you can gain rewards to help kick-start your collection, including a new theme deck, 250 Trainer Tokens, a booster pack, and a random Pokémon-EX. Pokémon-EX are some of the most powerful cards in the game, so they're an especially valuable addition to your collection!
Trainer Challenge
In the Trainer Challenge, you'll play using theme decks against computer-controlled opponents in three different League Cup competitions. The Trainer Challenge offers players multiple levels of rewards, including:
Winning a match with a Basic theme deck unlocks a new card for the deck. There are 7 cards to unlock for each Basic deck.
Winning 12 matches with a Basic theme deck unlocks that deck for use in Versus Mode.
Winning 12 matches with another theme deck (one that can already be used in Versus Mode) earns you a booster pack.
Each of the 12 Trainers in the Trainer Challenge has a progress meter, measured in stars. When you play a match against that Trainer, the meter will fill up, and you'll receive Trainer Tokens based on your progress. When you hit four stars, you'll win a booster pack.
The first time you defeat all 12 Trainers in a League, you'll win booster packs!
Multiplayer Rewards
Bonus Wheel Rewards
After every Versus or Tournament match you play, win or lose, you get to spin a Bonus Wheel for a reward. These wheels sometimes feature cool bonus rewards in addition to the standard reward! Bonus Wheel rewards include Trainer Tokens, Tournament Tickets, Uncommon Chests, and the Victor's Mystery Box.
Versus Rewards
In Versus Mode, you can choose a theme deck or a deck you've built from your growing collection to play against another player. Then, after every match—whether you win or lose—you will earn rewards, including unlocking the Mental Might theme deck for your collection after playing your first Versus match.
Versus Points are awarded each time you win a match in Versus Mode. As you earn Versus Points, you'll unlock Versus Rewards—cool stuff like Trainer Tokens, booster packs, even Pokémon-EX! Every three weeks, all Versus Points reset and the Versus Rewards rotate, so there are always new rewards to unlock.
Tournament Rewards
You can enter 8-player single-elimination tournaments by redeeming Tournament Tickets or Trainer Tokens. Tournaments can use theme decks or decks you've built. Each tournament offers rewards depending on how well you do, including Trainer Tokens, Tournament Tickets, booster packs, and Uncommon Chests. And you get to spin a Bonus Wheel after every match you play!
More to Come
Look forward to a new tournament leaderboard system coming soon. This leaderboard system will offer multiple rewards for players to compete toward, based on total tournament play over a set time period. Check back for details!
It's an exciting time for the Pokémon Trading Card Game Online, and we're looking forward to sharing many more updates and improvements with you as the game continues to evolve. Watch for details to come about new features, improvements, events, and so much more!
...C'mon WotC. Step it up. Seriously.
Most of this is already done in Duels. Wizards has made it very clear that if you're looking for something that feels more like a video game, Duels is what you get. Duels is their answer to HS. It functions almost identically to what Herthstone does. Magic is FAR more complex than HS, so it takes more to make MTGO function than it does for HS. HS is also an online-only game, if something is difficult to code or doesn't work within their code, they just don't do it, whereas MTGO is tasked with perfectly recreating a paper game that doesn't have the limitations of code functionality.
I don't understand why people clamor for animations and sound effects on MTGO. If you want to play a video game, you can play Duels. MTGO is supposed to be a digital recreation of paper Magic. Paper Magic doesn't have sound effects and flashing lights. I'm much more interested in Wizards making the client run more smoothly, reducing downtimes to around 1 per month, having MTGO pre-releases and releases coincide with paper, etc. than I am with seeing a little flame come out of my opponent when I cast Fiery Temper.
I do wish that Wizards would follow suit with Pokemon on codes in paper packs, cheaper online packs, etc, but that would require them to do away with redemption, and that's not nearly as simple as you make it out to be. Yes most MTGO users will never redeem a set, but there are certainly those that use it as a cheaper way to get their collections than buying straight from paper, and it is also a key component of the bot system.
As I'm sure you've probably noticed, cards are much cheaper on MTGO than they are in paper. Part of this is due to the fact that more cards are opened and fed back into the secondary market relative to number of players seeking those cards compared to the paper market. This is due to the high number of MTGO users that only draft and don't play any constructed, so they sell their cards straight to bots after the draft is over. Simple supply and demand. This is good for constructed players, as they can get cards cheaper than in paper, and when they want to move on from a deck, can sell the cards back for generally much more of their worth than they would get selling cards in paper.
Bots can do this for two reasons. One is that they can buy commons and uncommons for 1/100th of a cent, and then sell them all for a cent a piece. The other is because many bots are set up to make their money off redemption. When bots redeem sets, all those cards they bought from you jump way higher in price than if you had bought a set from them. All those commons and uncommons they bought from you for .001 tickets are now worth 10-80 cents. All those junk rares they bought from you for .3 tickets are now worth $1, and all those Playable rares and mythics they can make a 50-100% profit on.
Obviously that's decent business for something that has as low of setup and operation cost as an MTGO bot. I'm not sure how taking that away would affect the bot system, but I'm sure there would be some consequences.
Wizards should pay to have the quality and quantity of employees necessary to make MTGO run smoothly before they worry about any of this, though.
It'll be cool to see the first set, Jace and Chandra, which will probably accompany Kaladesh. Followed by Jace and Ajani in the next block, then Jace and Liliana, then Jace and Gideon, then Jace and Garruk, and finally Jace and Jace.
I am curious about the cards that benefit you having a planeswalker in play too, like the oath cards. if they just ask you to have the planeswalker subtype (Chandra, Gideon, etc.) that will be way more interesting.
they aren't supposed to be good either so maybe we will see a jace, memory adept reprint!
I am curious about the cards that benefit you having a planeswalker in play too, like the oath cards. if they just ask you to have the planeswalker subtype (Chandra, Gideon, etc.) that will be way more interesting.
they aren't supposed to be good either so maybe we will see a jace, memory adept reprint!
They're supposed to not be playable in any constructed format. Jace, Memory Adept is playable in some types of mill decks, so he's too strong. We're not talking fringe T3 power level, we're talking average intro-deck starter rare power level, which is _much_ worse than that, at least outside of limited. They specifically seem to want to avoid any constructed playability, so it probably won't be good in Commander either. It might be viable in some low-powered cubes though, ones designed so that the power level of the average intro-deck rare is viable.
I am curious about the cards that benefit you having a planeswalker in play too, like the oath cards. if they just ask you to have the planeswalker subtype (Chandra, Gideon, etc.) that will be way more interesting.
they aren't supposed to be good either so maybe we will see a jace, memory adept reprint!
They're supposed to not be playable in any constructed format. Jace, Memory Adept is playable in some types of mill decks, so he's too strong. We're not talking fringe T3 power level, we're talking average intro-deck starter rare power level, which is _much_ worse than that, at least outside of limited. They specifically seem to want to avoid any constructed playability, so it probably won't be good in Commander either. It might be viable in some low-powered cubes though, ones designed so that the power level of the average intro-deck rare is viable.
In their minds, Delver of Secrets was weak.
The people making magic don't know ***** about balancing the powerlevel, I mean when was the last time that MaRo didn't call the previous set an overpowered mistake as soon as it stopped being shipped to stores?
To be fair, I'm certain that that's the exact reaction WotC wants out of anyone who's already invested enough in the game to be posting on a site like MTGSalvation.
To be fair, I'm certain that that's the exact reaction WotC wants out of anyone who's already invested enough in the game to be posting on a site like MTGSalvation.
Cube is a wide ranging phenomenon of various power levels and skill levels and intent to construct a play environment. With that said, Cube is designed based on various tools that are from a multitude of product that you have to refine overtime. EDH is different equally as there is competitive, pauper, and so forth.
Making these constructed playable with an okay power level and interesting mechanics would go farther than anything they have done in years for new players and "enfranchised" players who want a lower power level environment. Not every Cube or EDH deck is designed to be the most powerful.
Cubes with a lower power level are easier to control, and Planeswalkers are more difficult to balance. Having Planeswalkers that are easy to balance creates an opportunity for lower and middle tier level playing environment.
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There probably aren't really that many "precon collectors like you." Think of it this way- literally all "people like you" will auto-buy these. Great for WotC. MOST people don't buy ANY intro pack trash, but SO MANY people will probably buy one or probably BOTH of these because of exclusive stuff. Sure they lose ~1 point from you folks, but get +100 points from everyone else. This is intuitively obvious to even the most casual observer.
Feel free to tell me yours!
I'm not arguing about the contents. I am arguing about the fact that there are 2 instead of 4 or 5 per set. If there are 4 or 5 and they are as good as the planeswalkers decks claim to be, that means more sales for wotc as 4 or 5 decks per set means more matchups than 2 decks per set.
Spitting Earth
Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
Glimpse the Unthinkable
Nemesis of Reason
Elspeth
Raise the Alarm
Think of the lore!!!!
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Anyway, I expect these Walkers will be lower powered with some color utility abilities like Green with Giant Growth.
It's either you are on team A or team B, even though the story also has team C, team D, and team E, while in the second set of the block, you can only be team F or team G, even if there is also team H, team I, and team J. The best example is with the Ravnica guilds and how 2 decks per set can fit with 10 guilds if WOTC decides to return there for a third time.
Not to mention that you can "explore" the themes and mechanics of the set if they don't make a deck for each theme and mechanic, and I highly doubt that each set has 2 or less themes and mechanics.
It's actually pretty heartwarming to see someone actually care about intro packs and their contents, the deck identity, mechanics, and variety. You must realize that you are a rarity among magic players though. Too few people actually give a darn about everything you mentioned. Planeswalkers are so much hotter, and so IN YOUR FACE. Planeswalkers are so hyped every set, but many new players don't get to open these cool characters. Now they do. It's a better intro pack experience overall. Don't worry though- I expect many years of cool stuff like this years' products going forward. You still have so much cool and unique stuff to collect
Feel free to tell me yours!
Last theme deck i bought was The RG from Shadowmore And although it had All Deck lists in them They also had THE how to play and improvements in a short text, Had the Book Story blurb too.
I know that theme decks Had the strategy insert With THE blurb of the theme of the deck ( UB deck from invasion Had a litle story of the horors of Phyrexia While the WUBRG One was all about the Forces of the coalision and its forces for exemple ) and Man i miss those stories i remenber spending 10 minutes reading and reading again almost all of the Kamigawa one, one with the story of seishiro and how he was rased by the monks, the other, If i remenber well Had a blurb on Inname and the White one Had a more in Deph of the eiganjo vs the Kami... It was really apealing. But they have not discontinued them. They are still there but smaler, and Now We have the UNchanted Realms and other flavors... For exemple: part of the story of the 2 Rangers that were hunting a werewolf that apeared To be in the town Cold easily be the blurb for the GU deck, part of the story asking Olivia for help could be the BR Vampires intro deck blurb. The story about Thalia and Odric could be the UW blurb The Girtrog one for the BG deliriun one.
And This aplies to Each colection that has Had the UR articles for them.
But all in all if You like the old Theme decks then commander decks are for you .
On a sidenote the article says those New introwalkers decks will try to be more focused on the theme of the colection Soo At least they i think they wIll try to push New mwchanics on them and maybe i Can play them againt casual decks again
For me the $34.99 price tag is a turn off, which is why I like intro packs even though they suck. If only there were 4 planeswalker decks or 2 planeswalker decks for $14.99 and 3 regular non-planeswalkers decks for a cheaper price like $11.99. 4 decks a block cannot show players all the themes and mechanics of the block, and a lot of veteran players are steering new players away from the joys of set exploration because intro packs can't beat the average constructed deck, nor can you sell the contents to break even.
I don't like product reviewers who say that a product sucks because they can't break even or make a profit by selling the cards. Theme decks for $10 was worth it because I used them a lot of times. Sure I wouldn't have made a profit by selling the cards but the value comes from using the deck.
Theme decks and intro packs for me allow me to get a feel for the set without totally investing too much into the game but I guess WOTC wants people to unload their wallet into their stuff. Why else would they include one more booster in the fat pack? That's an excuse for a price hike.
The quantity of set associated precons allow for more matchups, especially when I play with people who aren't into magic, I could lend them one of my 300+ theme decks or intro packs and use them. That is the value I find with the lowly intro pack.
Back, again with the 2 vs 5 thing. With 2 decks per set, it is nothing more than the same problem I had with duel decks and Event Decks. Duel decks was just Deck A vs Deck B. Intro packs were Deck A vs Deck B, Deck A vs Deck C, Deck D vs Deck E, and 7 other different matchups, provided you don't match up against the same deck. Duel Decks came about because they wanted to make a flavor based precon, but because they already have a flavor based duel deck, they just took all the flavor away from the theme decks when they became intro packs. There is flavor in them, except that you have to imagine it very hard. All I ask for is for the flavor to return to the set associated precon, which is happening with the planeswalker deck, but here is a new problem. You are only capturing some of the flavor because of the 2 instead of 5 decks per set thing.
I am arguing for 5 instead of 2, not the fact that the contents of an intro pack became the contents of a planeswalker deck. I could care less for that. All I ask for is for 5 choices per set. As a side effect of the change to planewalker deck, we will be seeing the same planeswalker mug every 2 or 3 sets instead of having a variety of cool creatures as the cover card.
Imagine that people get to play with cool planewalkers. Imagine that they had 5 to choose from, instead of 2. As I said, one person would more likely buy the entire set of 5, but now 3 sales are lost because they already completed the set at 2, especially now that they have planeswalkers in them. I should really say that each person would most likely buy at most 2 decks, and the potential up to $45 is lost. It is even less likely for one person to buy more than one of the same precon. Even with 2 choices, I highly doubt anyone would buy one and completely ignore the other one, especially with each deck at $14.99.
What I would like to see is for large set to have 5 planeswalker decks, and for the small set to have the run of the mill theme deck, but the theme deck will have some blurb on how to combine the deck with the planeswalker deck from the large set. You remember Clash Packs right? Remember how they have 2 decks, both with completely different mechanical themes, for example Origins, one was about Renown, the other was about Bolster and Outlast, and how you could combine them into one mega deck? Remember how intro packs are color coded White, Blue, Black, Red, Green? The Planeswalker decks for large sets and run of the mill theme decks for small sets, all come in sets of 5, and are color coded like intro packs, and the idea here is that the theme deck, let's say the one packaged in Red, will have a blurb and combined decklist for a combined Red Planeswalker deck and Red theme deck, and the themes and mechanics of the Red Theme Deck work well with the Red Planeswalker deck. That is how it should have been. The precon from the small set supplementing the precon from the large set. The decks separately would have its own story based flavor, but the combined decks would not have any story based flavor, but instead enhance the experience of combining 2 mechanical themes, much like what Clash Packs used to do. With 1 mythic and 4 rares (I assume 2 exclusive rares and 2 set specific rares) from the planewalker deck, and 2 more rares from the theme deck, that makes 7 rares, which what the first few event decks had. Combining the 2 decks would essentially give you a block constructed event deck, although you would have to wait for the small set to come out to achieve that. Ideally, I would like the Planeswalker deck to have 1 mythic, 2 exclusive rares, and 3 set specific rares, while the theme deck having only 4 set specific rares. Combining them would equate to your typical 10 rare event deck. This is one way to have 10 decks per block, without having to have 10 planeswalkers per block. One block already has 4 planewalker decks anyway, so adding one more, placing them all in the first set of the block, and having 5 decks with no planewalkers in them that supplement the planeswalker deck in the first set is a better idea, and more sales because people are more likely want to buy all 5 planewalkers, as well as the 5 supplemental theme decks from the small set because they have the potential to change the Planeswalker deck into an event deck. Note that each deck separately is still a functional deck, and isn't half a deck that doesn't work on its own. It is exactly like the clash pack decks separated.
1. Planeswalkers are in the deck.
2. All the themes and mechanics are covered
3. Event decks, although block constructed, are back. Ok, they are whatever the combined clash pack decks would be.
I understand what appeals to you, but I have no doubt that this is as much of a reaction to sales as it is a creative decision. I guarantee that if intro packs sold well they would not have been dropped. I know that LGS could not care less about them, and I see leftover intro decks from previous sets on the racks at big box stores long after the next set has come out.
imagine that WotC runs out of PW design space twice as quickly (if you are talking about per set). Wizards doesn't want 5 for them to choose from, they want to two that will get bought. The other three are just waste. Having 2/set means that people are much more likely to buy 100% of this product each set, and they don't have to put money into producing a product that so many players ignore and let gather dust on shelves.
No, because most people (who look at this kind of product) will still only buy two no matter how many choices they have. The others would just sit on shelves. I will grant you that 5 PW decks would draw more people to buy for a bit, but as soon as WotC proved that these walkers were not going anywhere near competitive play the sales would drop off again. Very few people are going to spend the $45 extra dollars to get 3 more decks that are aimed at players who are transitioning from Duels or the free decks regardless if they have Timmy walkers in them or not. The threshold for how much the target audience is willing to spend on low level product is finite, and printing 5 choices just makes for more waste.
Besides, psychology has shown that as much as people think they want more choices, they are actually more satisfied with the choice they make if they are given fewer options to choose from.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
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PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
Feel free to tell me yours!
You are saying that all themes and mechanics in a set shouldn't be covered, and that there should be less CHOICE for people to choose from. Have you seen every player in your store choose the same 2 intro packs, leaving the other 3 to collect dust, or do some player prefer intro pack 1 and intro pack 2, while another might prefer intro pack 3 and intro pack 5? As for pw design space. If you read my suggestion, they could release 5 pw decks only in large sets, and in the small sets, release 5 theme decks that are designed to combine with the pw decks from the previous set. There you have planeswalkers, 5 per block, more themes to CHOOSE from, and a potential block constructed worthy deck.
Big and Splashy.. Precisely what defines a fun card for me in Commander. These walkers will probably be used almost exclusively in EDH decks, since the effects will not be good enough or the cost too high for standard/eternal formats. I really hope they realize this and take a look at the Duel Deck series and print these walkers as foils to make all the shiny Commander pimps like me happy
Most of this is already done in Duels. Wizards has made it very clear that if you're looking for something that feels more like a video game, Duels is what you get. Duels is their answer to HS. It functions almost identically to what Herthstone does. Magic is FAR more complex than HS, so it takes more to make MTGO function than it does for HS. HS is also an online-only game, if something is difficult to code or doesn't work within their code, they just don't do it, whereas MTGO is tasked with perfectly recreating a paper game that doesn't have the limitations of code functionality.
I don't understand why people clamor for animations and sound effects on MTGO. If you want to play a video game, you can play Duels. MTGO is supposed to be a digital recreation of paper Magic. Paper Magic doesn't have sound effects and flashing lights. I'm much more interested in Wizards making the client run more smoothly, reducing downtimes to around 1 per month, having MTGO pre-releases and releases coincide with paper, etc. than I am with seeing a little flame come out of my opponent when I cast Fiery Temper.
I do wish that Wizards would follow suit with Pokemon on codes in paper packs, cheaper online packs, etc, but that would require them to do away with redemption, and that's not nearly as simple as you make it out to be. Yes most MTGO users will never redeem a set, but there are certainly those that use it as a cheaper way to get their collections than buying straight from paper, and it is also a key component of the bot system.
As I'm sure you've probably noticed, cards are much cheaper on MTGO than they are in paper. Part of this is due to the fact that more cards are opened and fed back into the secondary market relative to number of players seeking those cards compared to the paper market. This is due to the high number of MTGO users that only draft and don't play any constructed, so they sell their cards straight to bots after the draft is over. Simple supply and demand. This is good for constructed players, as they can get cards cheaper than in paper, and when they want to move on from a deck, can sell the cards back for generally much more of their worth than they would get selling cards in paper.
Bots can do this for two reasons. One is that they can buy commons and uncommons for 1/100th of a cent, and then sell them all for a cent a piece. The other is because many bots are set up to make their money off redemption. When bots redeem sets, all those cards they bought from you jump way higher in price than if you had bought a set from them. All those commons and uncommons they bought from you for .001 tickets are now worth 10-80 cents. All those junk rares they bought from you for .3 tickets are now worth $1, and all those Playable rares and mythics they can make a 50-100% profit on.
Obviously that's decent business for something that has as low of setup and operation cost as an MTGO bot. I'm not sure how taking that away would affect the bot system, but I'm sure there would be some consequences.
Wizards should pay to have the quality and quantity of employees necessary to make MTGO run smoothly before they worry about any of this, though.
Theme decks from back in the day......Those were good. I liked the booklet that came with them as well.
none
Modern
UBG B/U/G control
BBB MBC
WUR Control
WWW Prison
RRR Goblins
Legacy
BBB Pox
UBG B/U/G Control
UWU StoneBlade
UW Miracle Control
Modern
Commander
Cube
<a href="http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-lists/588020-unpowered-themed-enchantment-an-enchanted-evening">An Enchanted Evening Cube </a>
they aren't supposed to be good either so maybe we will see a jace, memory adept reprint!
They're supposed to not be playable in any constructed format. Jace, Memory Adept is playable in some types of mill decks, so he's too strong. We're not talking fringe T3 power level, we're talking average intro-deck starter rare power level, which is _much_ worse than that, at least outside of limited. They specifically seem to want to avoid any constructed playability, so it probably won't be good in Commander either. It might be viable in some low-powered cubes though, ones designed so that the power level of the average intro-deck rare is viable.
In their minds, Delver of Secrets was weak.
The people making magic don't know ***** about balancing the powerlevel, I mean when was the last time that MaRo didn't call the previous set an overpowered mistake as soon as it stopped being shipped to stores?
Theros block? I'm pretty sure they've acknowledged that as weak, other than Thoughtseize.
I for one, can't wait until Karn vs Tezzeret.
Cube is a wide ranging phenomenon of various power levels and skill levels and intent to construct a play environment. With that said, Cube is designed based on various tools that are from a multitude of product that you have to refine overtime. EDH is different equally as there is competitive, pauper, and so forth.
Making these constructed playable with an okay power level and interesting mechanics would go farther than anything they have done in years for new players and "enfranchised" players who want a lower power level environment. Not every Cube or EDH deck is designed to be the most powerful.
Cubes with a lower power level are easier to control, and Planeswalkers are more difficult to balance. Having Planeswalkers that are easy to balance creates an opportunity for lower and middle tier level playing environment.
Modern
Commander
Cube
<a href="http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-lists/588020-unpowered-themed-enchantment-an-enchanted-evening">An Enchanted Evening Cube </a>