Right, AB cards are in high demand because of nostalgia and the fact that all other printings of many of the cards in AB were in white boarder. However, the price disparity between many of the cards, at the same or lower rarity, is because of 93/94. If you consider cards that are iconic, like Lord of the Pit, Nightmare, Force of Nature, and Demonic Hordes, you will see that their pricing is around $200-$300. Just like my example of Lord of Atlantis from above, these cards are almost nonexistent in 93/94, yet cards like Jayemdae Tome and Disrupting Scepter are worth $400+. Why is this? They are all Alpha/Beta rares and are basically terrible cards by today's standards. Yet Scepter and Tome are worth considerably more; even double in some cases. The reason why Scepter and Tome are worth more, is because of 93/94 playability. Both cards are played in one of the top decks in the format, called "The Deck". http://www.eternalcentral.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/JonHammackECOSEW17Deck.jpg
Thanks for pointing this out. When I was a kid, I remember saving up $60 to purchase a single pack of legends, the last pack the store had. This was a few years after legends came out, which is why is was so expensive even then. The rare I opened was recall. I was disappointed at the time, since it was one of the less valuable rares because it was reprinted in chronicles. Still I never got rid of it. Now Becasue of this 93/94 format that your post just made me aware of, I looked it up and it’s a card that’s around $100. Still not the best legends rare to have opened, but hey, it’s nice to know I made my childhood $60 back.
It's hard to put into words my own feelings on Magic the Gathering. The thing is I started around Portal when the game was still young and the reserved list wasn't even something that was heavily talked about. Back then most of us casual players or newbies just picked up cards to play and often had no idea what deck building even was supposed to be like. Back in the 90s it felt like a game that played off ones imagination to power it and that rarity didn't really matter as much as the theme of what one was trying to build.
Trying to compare what the game is now to what it was is just insane. It went from a game that was slow and had lots of different lines of play into this carefully engineered standard experience, where cards are purposefully created to be worse than others and discarded, with a shadow of it's former glory being painted with modern and legacy. Might I add, both despite being "healthy", play worse than the original game did.
you pretty much nailed it. except for that one summer you could pretty much show up with anything and expect to have fun. decks were more creative and games tended to go much longer. i miss the days of cards designed for the sake of designing cards, and less like a finely tuned OMG PLAY THIS IN STANDARD PLAY THAT IN LIMITED machine that its become. it makes formats extremely uninteresting to me and a result i stopped playing standard, participating in limited events years ago.
as for uma?
**** uma.
look, i'm all for lower card prices, thats cool thats great, but its also a balance and to maintain the health of the game you do want some high value cards, regardless, the solution is not to create a set that pulls out all of the stops... and then jack the price up, while simultaneously rewarding people for shelling out for it. at the premium price, even with the high value crap thrown in, you can't include ***** like balefire dragon. you just can't. its too big of a gamble, too big of a rip off, especially when some of that high value ***** everyone wants will inevitably come down in value as a result of the set... or maybe it won't since no one can afford to crack packs. it was time to call the masters sets done with the last one, not make an over powered but more expensive new one.
i can't support wotc's business model with this, and won't be purchasing any product as a result. i know it won't matter to their bottom line because we're all greedy sheep, but i can hope it does.
It's hard to put into words my own feelings on Magic the Gathering. The thing is I started around Portal when the game was still young and the reserved list wasn't even something that was heavily talked about. Back then most of us casual players or newbies just picked up cards to play and often had no idea what deck building even was supposed to be like. Back in the 90s it felt like a game that played off ones imagination to power it and that rarity didn't really matter as much as the theme of what one was trying to build.
Trying to compare what the game is now to what it was is just insane. It went from a game that was slow and had lots of different lines of play into this carefully engineered standard experience, where cards are purposefully created to be worse than others and discarded, with a shadow of it's former glory being painted with modern and legacy. Might I add, both despite being "healthy", play worse than the original game did.
You found it hard to express, but I felt you summarized the crux of the "problem" (mileage varies on perspective). Old players see MTG as a shadow of its former glory and want WotC to restore it, but WotC sees that restoring the old glory does nothing in making the game appealing to the next generation of gamers they now want to attract (and to be blunt that's true, because these generations are raised by technology and have vividly different expectations than the old gamers and any old gamer that assumes that "once a new player sees the old glory they will understand and desire it" is honestly deluding themselves, especially if they themselves dismiss "new gaming" as all-negative with no redeeming factors).
In a way WotC has already "abandoned" the old players - except logically it makes no sense for any company to actually declare it as a statement, but it's abandonment in the sense that if they really had to choose one they would pick the new and future generations of gamers over the old players but in practice it's more of a change of main target demographic reducing old players to a "side demographic" instead.
Even Star City Games, one of the largest retailers in the U.S., is selling pre-order booster boxes below MSRP. It looks like everybody is expecting that most of the good cards have already been shown.
People are gambling on the product being better than previous masters. I suspect that the box toppers might be a last minute addition to make it different, and the increased price a consequence. It may be they want to see the effect of box toppers on sales in order to correctly ascertain what gets people buying premium. WOTC have realised a huge run in and spoiler season leads to disappointment, because it always ends with Trees, Channel, and Comet Storms that should never be in a premium set because they are not and never have been premium. People can handle it when they get a 4, 6 or 8 dollar Shockland, Enlightened Tutor or other such usable cards that might grow, or even Mystical Tutors that are usable but won't grow, they can't when all they get is a two dollar card that has always been and always will be two dollars and has no use. In order to avoid this they have tried the box topper approach, which is potentially decent for Stores ripping and box buyers, or at least it would have been if it were not for a few Lavaclaw reach type cards. Box topping Eternal Witnesses might suck bext to Lilly, but they will have some value. The short run in has caught people unaware. I think it will be a bust for a fair few buying boxes to rip. It may be worth buying to sit on, the box toppers sealed in the box may make it worth it, but this is still a risk, we do not know how they will use up reprint equity in future. Cards like Emrakul are if limited demand and can't stand up to reprinting like Snappy et al, there will be significant tanking in price for them beyond the normal drop and recover slowly dynamic. There are enough good cards at the top end, we don't know the bottom beyond the small amounts of chaff spoiled.
I have made a lot of money off mtg, I have not bought sealed product for a while and sat on it, and I am reserving judgement till I see the list because I suspect it won't be the gift that keeps on giving.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
People are gambling on the product being better than previous masters. I suspect that the box toppers might be a last minute addition to make it different, and the increased price a consequence. It may be they want to see the effect of box toppers on sales in order to correctly ascertain what gets people buying premium. WOTC have realised a huge run in and spoiler season leads to disappointment, because it always ends with Trees, Channel, and Comet Storms that should never be in a premium set because they are not and never have been premium. People can handle it when they get a 4, 6 or 8 dollar Shockland, Enlightened Tutor or other such usable cards that might grow, or even Mystical Tutors that are usable but won't grow, they can't when all they get is a two dollar card that has always been and always will be two dollars and has no use. In order to avoid this they have tried the box topper approach, which is potentially decent for Stores ripping and box buyers, or at least it would have been if it were not for a few Lavaclaw reach type cards. Box topping Eternal Witnesses might suck bext to Lilly, but they will have some value. The short run in has caught people unaware. I think it will be a bust for a fair few buying boxes to rip. It may be worth buying to sit on, the box toppers sealed in the box may make it worth it, but this is still a risk, we do not know how they will use up reprint equity in future. Cards like Emrakul are if limited demand and can't stand up to reprinting like Snappy et al, there will be significant tanking in price for them beyond the normal drop and recover slowly dynamic. There are enough good cards at the top end, we don't know the bottom beyond the small amounts of chaff spoiled.
I have made a lot of money off mtg, I have not bought sealed product for a while and sat on it, and I am reserving judgement till I see the list because I suspect it won't be the gift that keeps on giving.
They upped the price because of the box topper. The thing this they just increased the price of their entire product line to account for inflation and We already know this was designed in the same group as the last two masters sets, so the only line of play that makes any sense is that they added the toppers and raised the MSRP to make sure the box prices do not collapse.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
So this is a bit of a blunt approach, but let me put it like this: My first deck was in 1995 or so, and it was about 90 cards, all of it Lightning Bolts and Mesa Pegasus with "enough" lands to play enough of them out to win a game here or there. It was a ton of fun, and I've enjoyed Magic ever since! However, I much prefer playing a finely-tuned 3-Land Belcher deck in Modern to running old Kamigawa-block White Weenie or some such. Sure, games went longer "Back in the Day", but there's plenty of potential in interesting, interactive decks in most formats right now, and Standard is quite enjoyable. All these Rose-Colored Glasses feel like a bunch of BS to me; decks weren't necessarily "more fun" in the past, we just played in a manner that felt more fun in our small groups.
I don't think that even reanimate as an uncommon wouldn't been backbreaking if reanimation strategies were not too strong in limited.
You don´t think "B: get the best creature from any graveyard directly into play, lose some life" would be too good for uncommon? I have to disagree. Limited is all about creatures, Reanimate doesn´t require you to do anything reanimation related with your deck. You could target a Grizzly Bears with it and it would still be passable.
Every prior printing of Reanimate ever has been at uncommon. And this is a masters set, where the limited environment is expected to be more powerful (cube-like) and historically "broken" combos may be possible.
Reanimate was upshifted to rare because it's currently above $20 on the secondary market. Not for limited balance.
I don't think that even reanimate as an uncommon wouldn't been backbreaking if reanimation strategies were not too strong in limited.
You don´t think "B: get the best creature from any graveyard directly into play, lose some life" would be too good for uncommon? I have to disagree. Limited is all about creatures, Reanimate doesn´t require you to do anything reanimation related with your deck. You could target a Grizzly Bears with it and it would still be passable.
Every prior printing of Reanimate ever has been at uncommon. And this is a masters set, where the limited environment is expected to be more powerful (cube-like) and historically "broken" combos may be possible.
Reanimate was upshifted to rare because it's currently above $20 on the secondary market. Not for limited balance.
The game would have been fine if they never started down this path of placing all intentionally constructed playable cards at rare and mythic outside of removal. I have to agree with others that the game has quickly shifted far too much in the direction of payers over players, and this reality is going to bite Wizards of the Coast eventually when the casual players start coming back less and less, and they've burned so many long term players that nothing they try sells.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I don't think that even reanimate as an uncommon wouldn't been backbreaking if reanimation strategies were not too strong in limited.
You don´t think "B: get the best creature from any graveyard directly into play, lose some life" would be too good for uncommon? I have to disagree. Limited is all about creatures, Reanimate doesn´t require you to do anything reanimation related with your deck. You could target a Grizzly Bears with it and it would still be passable.
Every prior printing of Reanimate ever has been at uncommon. And this is a masters set, where the limited environment is expected to be more powerful (cube-like) and historically "broken" combos may be possible.
Reanimate was upshifted to rare because it's currently above $20 on the secondary market. Not for limited balance.
Not saying you are wrong but ye u tecnically are. Reanimate had only 2 printings in uncommon (printings in boosters sets were draft matters). Vintage masters was the last time it was "printed" as a uncommon (only on mtgo).
I m not saying that they didn't print it as a uncommon because of the price tag, but maybe, just maybe it was about concern on the format.
Also, being a rare the price will not drop as much, making it a ok pull
Players have left the hamster wheel that is Standard for the evergreen fields of Commander, largely as a result of several factors. The way in which Standard is solved, the finance surrounding it, and for old timers like me the design paradigm. The attempts to remove unfun stuff and leave only stuff newer and casual players like was disastrous, and gave a Standard that was pure icing and sickly sweet, not to mention broken.
Modern players by and large have their decks. I don't know about you but whenever I see a Modern player with a well tuned and well played Death's Shadow as their primary deck I pretty much know when they started Modern, and it was not six months ago.
Ditto humans, Spirits, Hollow one. The thing is that bans aside they will likely be playing the same decks in a couple of years. They won't be changing any time soon. I know Storm players who will always be Storm players, most were Storm players five years ago. People swap, but for many Modern is the number two format, always second favorite behind something else, so they swap less often than you would think.
These Masters sets are often bought by richer casuals, often casuals who dabble in Modern but are not committed to it, and as such represent one of the fee ways WOTC can mine the casual Commander players. Including a few reprints in Standard sets to help sell them can boost sales to casuals, but the Master's set is a beautiful example of mining casuals, leading to buyer's remorse more often than not.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
I don't think that even reanimate as an uncommon wouldn't been backbreaking if reanimation strategies were not too strong in limited.
You don´t think "B: get the best creature from any graveyard directly into play, lose some life" would be too good for uncommon? I have to disagree. Limited is all about creatures, Reanimate doesn´t require you to do anything reanimation related with your deck. You could target a Grizzly Bears with it and it would still be passable.
Every prior printing of Reanimate ever has been at uncommon. And this is a masters set, where the limited environment is expected to be more powerful (cube-like) and historically "broken" combos may be possible.
Reanimate was upshifted to rare because it's currently above $20 on the secondary market. Not for limited balance.
The game would have been fine if they never started down this path of placing all intentionally constructed playable cards at rare and mythic outside of removal. I have to agree with others that the game has quickly shifted far too much in the direction of payers over players, and this reality is going to bite Wizards of the Coast eventually when the casual players start coming back less and less, and they've burned so many long term players that nothing they try sells.
Couldn't agree more with this! It would be interesting to see how many rarity shifts happened and how many of them were of "expensive" cards.
The fact that they aren't starting the next round of spoilers until the 19th, then are done in 3 days total sends up a HUGE red flag to me. This set is going to have the same amount of chaff as Iconic and Masters25. There are going to be a lot more "feel bad" openings. There are going to be packs with 50 cent rares and 25 cent foils. A dollar worth of cards for 12 to 15 bucks. The only way to mitigate this is to buy in volume. Buy many and the randomness smooths out. They won't but people need to wait until the spoilers are up. Don't ride the hype train people. Wait and see what is spoiled. At these prices EVERY pack should have a borderless regular(non-foil) rare in it. They could have done it and it would have made the pack price more tolerable. There are going to be a TON of feel-bad openings for those that buy a pack or two on impulse or the 3 pack blister packs. But as long as buyers keep buying it will continue down this path.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
The assumption made on the masters sets for the 25th anniversary is that there was supposed to only be one last year, but it got split in two due to Hascon.
While this set is the third horseman, unless they split this one in two as well with some non-masters masters set in the spring, it should be stronger than the last two sets.
I think they did poorly on the land cycles for all three sets as only half of each cycle really sees play.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The fact that they aren't starting the next round of spoilers until the 19th, then are done in 3 days total sends up a HUGE red flag to me. This set is going to have the same amount of chaff as Iconic and Masters25. There are going to be a lot more "feel bad" openings. There are going to be packs with 50 cent rares and 25 cent foils. A dollar worth of cards for 12 to 15 bucks. The only way to mitigate this is to buy in volume. Buy many and the randomness smooths out. They won't but people need to wait until the spoilers are up. Don't ride the hype train people. Wait and see what is spoiled. At these prices EVERY pack should have a borderless regular(non-foil) rare in it. They could have done it and it would have made the pack price more tolerable. There are going to be a TON of feel-bad openings for those that buy a pack or two on impulse or the 3 pack blister packs. But as long as buyers keep buying it will continue down this path.
At the time of this post, there are 34 Rares and 78 Uncommons to be spoiled. All the Mythics are known already; I think it's reasonable for 1 week for WotC (3 days of articles, assuming nothing drops on US Thanksgiving or US Black Friday) and all the other content creators to spoil the better parts of the set. I think starting around this time is when Youtube ad dollars are better for content creators so this set is a nice gift for them, whom quite honestly help WotC so much even to promote weak sets. I'm impressed that there has not been a major leak, so kudos to WotC legal and the printers for that.
Ultimately, I'm nervous about how they are going to introduce expensive/disruptive rare and mythic reprints for Modern without going through Standard with this version of Master sets coming to an end. I think we can assume whatever does happen, it will still cost a lot of money.
There's one Grand Prix in a reasonable distance from me in the current schedule, and of course it's Sealed Ultimate Masters. That's just bound to be a silly format for competitive.
At the time of this post, there are 34 Rares and 78 Uncommons to be spoiled.
Do we know for a fact how many rares are in this set?
The typical Masters set has had 15 mythics 53 rares, the typical distribution for a 121-card sheet with each rare appearing twice, and near the usual 1:7 mythic-to-rare ratio.
This set is known to have 20 mythics.
Does this mean there'll be ... 71 rares (so they can print two copies of each rare for each single copy of a mythic and keep the same ratio)? Does this mean they're screwing/redefining the ratio and having 20M+50R+blank on a 121 sheet? Or are they just printing 5 of the mythics separately and jamming them into collation somehow (which still feels to me like it'lll break ratio)? Do we know?
There's two ratios they like to preserve:
Each individual mythic is exactly half as many in circulation as each individual rare
Each pack has about a 1 in 8 shot at containing a mythic
The only way they can preserve both of these is to couple the 20-mythic roster with a ~71-rare roster.
I'm seeing comments like "Don't ride the hype train people" and "it is strange for me to see, so many people are hyped and buy this product", but I'm not seeing the hype. To me, this thread looks like twenty pages of (mostly) vitriol against the design of masters sets, with an occasional post of mild interest. If there's a hype train, I'm not seeing it.
I'll warrant that the vitriol is more earned here than in most places, as this set only exacerbates the known problem with masters sets by increasing the price. We can truthfully complain that we've been saying and saying this, and Wizards is willfully ignoring us.
Are you guys seeing something I'm not? Are people hyped about this somewhere else? They certainly aren't here.
Are you guys seeing something I'm not? Are people hyped about this somewhere else? They certainly aren't here.
Check ebay sales, youtubers, etc. The hype is there and the hype is real. Withholding spoilers for a three day window builds hype as well. Not to mention WotC hyping this set with never before seen Ultimate Box Toppers.
On top of that, don't go with what a small segment of the Magic population is saying here. The loudest voices aren't always the majority. And furthermore, there are tons of people who will bash the product and then just go buy it and not tell anyone they did so.
It is there, it is real. Its the age we live in right now. Flash over substance.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
The only people getting remotely worked up over this release are the #MTGFinance people and the people writing articles for those folks on websites and basically no one else.
The only people who value 'flash over substance' as you say are, to be completely honest with you, the deck pimps. That's about 1% of Magic players, hoenstly. The rest of us still value substance over flash.
The only people who value 'flash over substance' as you say are, to be completely honest with you, the deck pimps. That's about 1% of Magic players, hoenstly. The rest of us still value substance over flash.
And like in real life, the 1% who spend 50 plus percent of all the money on these products have the final say. Those of us "in the know" are going to get drowned out in the sea of hype by those who spend the money. Perception becomes reality. Its happening.
Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
The only people who value 'flash over substance' as you say are, to be completely honest with you, the deck pimps. That's about 1% of Magic players, hoenstly. The rest of us still value substance over flash.
And like in real life, the 1% who spend 50 plus percent of all the money on these products have the final say. Those of us "in the know" are going to get drowned out in the sea of hype by those who spend the money. Perception becomes reality. Its happening.
The set is 100% for collectors and investors. A price point of 300+ msrp is well above the purchasing power of most LGS regulars. I'm going to admit I'm a part of that target audience, which is why I did ultimately preorder a box. However, I'm far from an investor and have been shifting my collecting to other card games exactly because of these products.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
At the time of this post, there are 34 Rares and 78 Uncommons to be spoiled.
Do we know for a fact how many rares are in this set?
The typical Masters set has had 15 mythics 53 rares, the typical distribution for a 121-card sheet with each rare appearing twice, and near the usual 1:7 mythic-to-rare ratio.
This set is known to have 20 mythics.
Does this mean there'll be ... 71 rares (so they can print two copies of each rare for each single copy of a mythic and keep the same ratio)? Does this mean they're screwing/redefining the ratio and having 20M+50R+blank on a 121 sheet? Or are they just printing 5 of the mythics separately and jamming them into collation somehow (which still feels to me like it'lll break ratio)? Do we know?
There's two ratios they like to preserve:
Each individual mythic is exactly half as many in circulation as each individual rare
Each pack has about a 1 in 8 shot at containing a mythic
The only way they can preserve both of these is to couple the 20-mythic roster with a ~71-rare roster.
I pulled the numbers from the spreadsheet that is linked in the OP. I have not seen an official breakdown of the rarities and I did mean to say approximately, sorry. However, you brought up a good point with the 20 Mythics and not the usual 15. I crunched some numbers based on a 11x11 sheet and I don't see how they could print ~71 rares to maintain the 1:7 ratio even if the rares were on their own sheet. One scenario could be they print mythics on their own sheet but 6 times to make 120 cards, then have a 60 rare roster printing twice on a sheet with more sheets printed. That would effect the un/commons as well since their numbers will be lower and we know the set size already. That prospect of more rares than normal doesn't seem to add up especially since the MSRP is so much higher than before. On pure baseless speculation on my part, maybe more mythics are in a box of UMA and that justifies their price gouge...I mean increase? Could it be 1 in 5 (4-5 mythic box average not including the topper or foil) versus 3-4 mythic boxes? If I was getting 1 more mythic plus an altered art topper, that may justify the increase in price right there ~$50. Just something to think about until next week.
Many people have said it before, that it does not cost them extra to print a mythic than it is a common...it's cardboard and ink. However, by them adding just one extra mythic per box they can net more money because they are adding more value. That would be a nice send off to the Masters sets.
The fact that they aren't starting the next round of spoilers until the 19th, then are done in 3 days total sends up a HUGE red flag to me. This set is going to have the same amount of chaff as Iconic and Masters25. There are going to be a lot more "feel bad" openings. There are going to be packs with 50 cent rares and 25 cent foils. A dollar worth of cards for 12 to 15 bucks. The only way to mitigate this is to buy in volume. Buy many and the randomness smooths out. They won't but people need to wait until the spoilers are up. Don't ride the hype train people. Wait and see what is spoiled. At these prices EVERY pack should have a borderless regular(non-foil) rare in it. They could have done it and it would have made the pack price more tolerable. There are going to be a TON of feel-bad openings for those that buy a pack or two on impulse or the 3 pack blister packs. But as long as buyers keep buying it will continue down this path.
I have a worse scenario than this.
Mine is where every pack has an EV of 8-10$ (average) and it's easy to break even+ on any box. The set is filled with modern/legacy staples. So what happens? The limited print run causes the packs to rise to 25$ each and the boxes well over 500$.
I thin it's basically impossible to have this sort of thing work out positively for anybody. In a way, i'm kind of glad they are shelving these. it causes so much brouhaha in the community every single time.
I'm sure there are a lot of standard environments where many of these cards could see a reprint. This will rest on the balance team, who seems to be doing an amazing job (Tom Ross, Mike & co). If that keeps it up, I wouldn't be worried about introducing something like Snap Caster again. It didn't break standard the first time, it won't break it again.
Was kinda on the Fence for Master Sets from the beginning. I like the reprinting, the new art for Bitterblossom makes me really happy too. But I dislike how WOTC tends to handle this product line.
Can't say I will be able to buy this product with the high price on packs, but I am hoping for some modern staples to drop low enough for some quick grabs though.
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Never forget whose grace and favor led to your success and always give your thanks, otherwise you might be doomed to loose it.
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you pretty much nailed it. except for that one summer you could pretty much show up with anything and expect to have fun. decks were more creative and games tended to go much longer. i miss the days of cards designed for the sake of designing cards, and less like a finely tuned OMG PLAY THIS IN STANDARD PLAY THAT IN LIMITED machine that its become. it makes formats extremely uninteresting to me and a result i stopped playing standard, participating in limited events years ago.
as for uma?
**** uma.
look, i'm all for lower card prices, thats cool thats great, but its also a balance and to maintain the health of the game you do want some high value cards, regardless, the solution is not to create a set that pulls out all of the stops... and then jack the price up, while simultaneously rewarding people for shelling out for it. at the premium price, even with the high value crap thrown in, you can't include ***** like balefire dragon. you just can't. its too big of a gamble, too big of a rip off, especially when some of that high value ***** everyone wants will inevitably come down in value as a result of the set... or maybe it won't since no one can afford to crack packs. it was time to call the masters sets done with the last one, not make an over powered but more expensive new one.
i can't support wotc's business model with this, and won't be purchasing any product as a result. i know it won't matter to their bottom line because we're all greedy sheep, but i can hope it does.
You found it hard to express, but I felt you summarized the crux of the "problem" (mileage varies on perspective). Old players see MTG as a shadow of its former glory and want WotC to restore it, but WotC sees that restoring the old glory does nothing in making the game appealing to the next generation of gamers they now want to attract (and to be blunt that's true, because these generations are raised by technology and have vividly different expectations than the old gamers and any old gamer that assumes that "once a new player sees the old glory they will understand and desire it" is honestly deluding themselves, especially if they themselves dismiss "new gaming" as all-negative with no redeeming factors).
In a way WotC has already "abandoned" the old players - except logically it makes no sense for any company to actually declare it as a statement, but it's abandonment in the sense that if they really had to choose one they would pick the new and future generations of gamers over the old players but in practice it's more of a change of main target demographic reducing old players to a "side demographic" instead.
I have made a lot of money off mtg, I have not bought sealed product for a while and sat on it, and I am reserving judgement till I see the list because I suspect it won't be the gift that keeps on giving.
They upped the price because of the box topper. The thing this they just increased the price of their entire product line to account for inflation and We already know this was designed in the same group as the last two masters sets, so the only line of play that makes any sense is that they added the toppers and raised the MSRP to make sure the box prices do not collapse.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Every prior printing of Reanimate ever has been at uncommon. And this is a masters set, where the limited environment is expected to be more powerful (cube-like) and historically "broken" combos may be possible.
Reanimate was upshifted to rare because it's currently above $20 on the secondary market. Not for limited balance.
The game would have been fine if they never started down this path of placing all intentionally constructed playable cards at rare and mythic outside of removal. I have to agree with others that the game has quickly shifted far too much in the direction of payers over players, and this reality is going to bite Wizards of the Coast eventually when the casual players start coming back less and less, and they've burned so many long term players that nothing they try sells.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Not saying you are wrong but ye u tecnically are. Reanimate had only 2 printings in uncommon (printings in boosters sets were draft matters). Vintage masters was the last time it was "printed" as a uncommon (only on mtgo).
I m not saying that they didn't print it as a uncommon because of the price tag, but maybe, just maybe it was about concern on the format.
Also, being a rare the price will not drop as much, making it a ok pull
Modern players by and large have their decks. I don't know about you but whenever I see a Modern player with a well tuned and well played Death's Shadow as their primary deck I pretty much know when they started Modern, and it was not six months ago.
Ditto humans, Spirits, Hollow one. The thing is that bans aside they will likely be playing the same decks in a couple of years. They won't be changing any time soon. I know Storm players who will always be Storm players, most were Storm players five years ago. People swap, but for many Modern is the number two format, always second favorite behind something else, so they swap less often than you would think.
These Masters sets are often bought by richer casuals, often casuals who dabble in Modern but are not committed to it, and as such represent one of the fee ways WOTC can mine the casual Commander players. Including a few reprints in Standard sets to help sell them can boost sales to casuals, but the Master's set is a beautiful example of mining casuals, leading to buyer's remorse more often than not.
Couldn't agree more with this! It would be interesting to see how many rarity shifts happened and how many of them were of "expensive" cards.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
While this set is the third horseman, unless they split this one in two as well with some non-masters masters set in the spring, it should be stronger than the last two sets.
I think they did poorly on the land cycles for all three sets as only half of each cycle really sees play.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
At the time of this post, there are 34 Rares and 78 Uncommons to be spoiled. All the Mythics are known already; I think it's reasonable for 1 week for WotC (3 days of articles, assuming nothing drops on US Thanksgiving or US Black Friday) and all the other content creators to spoil the better parts of the set. I think starting around this time is when Youtube ad dollars are better for content creators so this set is a nice gift for them, whom quite honestly help WotC so much even to promote weak sets. I'm impressed that there has not been a major leak, so kudos to WotC legal and the printers for that.
Ultimately, I'm nervous about how they are going to introduce expensive/disruptive rare and mythic reprints for Modern without going through Standard with this version of Master sets coming to an end. I think we can assume whatever does happen, it will still cost a lot of money.
Do we know for a fact how many rares are in this set?
The typical Masters set has had 15 mythics 53 rares, the typical distribution for a 121-card sheet with each rare appearing twice, and near the usual 1:7 mythic-to-rare ratio.
This set is known to have 20 mythics.
Does this mean there'll be ... 71 rares (so they can print two copies of each rare for each single copy of a mythic and keep the same ratio)? Does this mean they're screwing/redefining the ratio and having 20M+50R+blank on a 121 sheet? Or are they just printing 5 of the mythics separately and jamming them into collation somehow (which still feels to me like it'lll break ratio)? Do we know?
There's two ratios they like to preserve:
Each individual mythic is exactly half as many in circulation as each individual rare
Each pack has about a 1 in 8 shot at containing a mythic
The only way they can preserve both of these is to couple the 20-mythic roster with a ~71-rare roster.
I'll warrant that the vitriol is more earned here than in most places, as this set only exacerbates the known problem with masters sets by increasing the price. We can truthfully complain that we've been saying and saying this, and Wizards is willfully ignoring us.
Are you guys seeing something I'm not? Are people hyped about this somewhere else? They certainly aren't here.
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My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
Check ebay sales, youtubers, etc. The hype is there and the hype is real. Withholding spoilers for a three day window builds hype as well. Not to mention WotC hyping this set with never before seen Ultimate Box Toppers.
On top of that, don't go with what a small segment of the Magic population is saying here. The loudest voices aren't always the majority. And furthermore, there are tons of people who will bash the product and then just go buy it and not tell anyone they did so.
It is there, it is real. Its the age we live in right now. Flash over substance.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
The only people getting remotely worked up over this release are the #MTGFinance people and the people writing articles for those folks on websites and basically no one else.
The only people who value 'flash over substance' as you say are, to be completely honest with you, the deck pimps. That's about 1% of Magic players, hoenstly. The rest of us still value substance over flash.
We shall see..
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And like in real life, the 1% who spend 50 plus percent of all the money on these products have the final say. Those of us "in the know" are going to get drowned out in the sea of hype by those who spend the money. Perception becomes reality. Its happening.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
The set is 100% for collectors and investors. A price point of 300+ msrp is well above the purchasing power of most LGS regulars. I'm going to admit I'm a part of that target audience, which is why I did ultimately preorder a box. However, I'm far from an investor and have been shifting my collecting to other card games exactly because of these products.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I pulled the numbers from the spreadsheet that is linked in the OP. I have not seen an official breakdown of the rarities and I did mean to say approximately, sorry. However, you brought up a good point with the 20 Mythics and not the usual 15. I crunched some numbers based on a 11x11 sheet and I don't see how they could print ~71 rares to maintain the 1:7 ratio even if the rares were on their own sheet. One scenario could be they print mythics on their own sheet but 6 times to make 120 cards, then have a 60 rare roster printing twice on a sheet with more sheets printed. That would effect the un/commons as well since their numbers will be lower and we know the set size already. That prospect of more rares than normal doesn't seem to add up especially since the MSRP is so much higher than before. On pure baseless speculation on my part, maybe more mythics are in a box of UMA and that justifies their price gouge...I mean increase? Could it be 1 in 5 (4-5 mythic box average not including the topper or foil) versus 3-4 mythic boxes? If I was getting 1 more mythic plus an altered art topper, that may justify the increase in price right there ~$50. Just something to think about until next week.
Many people have said it before, that it does not cost them extra to print a mythic than it is a common...it's cardboard and ink. However, by them adding just one extra mythic per box they can net more money because they are adding more value. That would be a nice send off to the Masters sets.
My 720 Peasant Cube
I have a worse scenario than this.
Mine is where every pack has an EV of 8-10$ (average) and it's easy to break even+ on any box. The set is filled with modern/legacy staples. So what happens? The limited print run causes the packs to rise to 25$ each and the boxes well over 500$.
I thin it's basically impossible to have this sort of thing work out positively for anybody. In a way, i'm kind of glad they are shelving these. it causes so much brouhaha in the community every single time.
I'm sure there are a lot of standard environments where many of these cards could see a reprint. This will rest on the balance team, who seems to be doing an amazing job (Tom Ross, Mike & co). If that keeps it up, I wouldn't be worried about introducing something like Snap Caster again. It didn't break standard the first time, it won't break it again.
Can't say I will be able to buy this product with the high price on packs, but I am hoping for some modern staples to drop low enough for some quick grabs though.