Nice long winded answer without actually knowing why they reprinted those expensive cards. As you can clearly see modern masters 2 did nothing to elevate the extraordinary high prices of modern cards. They do not want cards that cost that much. 100 bucks is to much for a card in a format that they are supporting. They will reprint tarmogoyf because they have to its to expensive.
WotC does not care about the secondary market value of cards.
Yeah, they kind of do. They recognize that cards need to stay below a certain price to keep growth of a format sustainable. They also care about the secondary market because chase expensive cards that you have to buy sell sets and make Wizards money.
That's pretty obvious... put super desirable card in set, put set in boosters, watch booster/box sales go wild.
Also, the more people who can access the game at all levels, the less people who leave the game and stop buying product through frustration of being beaten by guys who have $10,000 decks.
At the end of the day, it all boils down to selling boosters.
Nice long winded answer without actually knowing why they reprinted those expensive cards. As you can clearly see modern masters 2 did nothing to elevate the extraordinary high prices of modern cards. They do not want cards that cost that much. 100 bucks is to much for a card in a format that they are supporting. They will reprint tarmogoyf because they have to its to expensive.
WotC does not care about the secondary market value of cards.
Yeah, they kind of do. They recognize that cards need to stay below a certain price to keep growth of a format sustainable. They also care about the secondary market because chase expensive cards that you have to buy sell sets and make Wizards money.
No they do not, because of two very simple reasons: 1#: They make no money of the secondary market. 2#: Caring about the secondary market would severely limit which cards they can reprint, which in turn is very bad for the older formats. Just look at the eternal formats as an example (Vintage and Legacy foremost) and see how difficult it is for people to afford to play them and stand a chance. Show me a man that can afford to buy any of the original moxes or a black lotus, and I'll show you a man who is wealthy.
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It's about time for the reserved list to die, for the sake of Vintage and Legacy (And Commander).
Nice long winded answer without actually knowing why they reprinted those expensive cards. As you can clearly see modern masters 2 did nothing to elevate the extraordinary high prices of modern cards. They do not want cards that cost that much. 100 bucks is to much for a card in a format that they are supporting. They will reprint tarmogoyf because they have to its to expensive.
WotC does not care about the secondary market value of cards.
Yeah, they kind of do. They recognize that cards need to stay below a certain price to keep growth of a format sustainable. They also care about the secondary market because chase expensive cards that you have to buy sell sets and make Wizards money.
No they do not, because of two very simple reasons: 1#: They make no money of the secondary market. 2#: Caring about the secondary market would severely limit which cards they can reprint, which in turn is very bad for the older formats. Just look at the eternal formats as an example (Vintage and Legacy foremost) and see how difficult it is for people to afford to play them and stand a chance. Show me a man that can afford to buy any of the original moxes or a black lotus, and I'll show you a man who is wealthy.
What about cards that aren't on the reserve list? Show me a man who can afford to buy a full set of Portal Three Kingdoms and so on. If they truly didn't care about it they'd just go ahead and print Imperial Seal and Capture of Jingzhou all over the place. When they do things like this, they keep the supply limited as they did in Modern Masters 1. They're clearly trying to strike a balance between making cards available to those who don't have them and preserving the value for people who already do. I mean, you're pretty much saying that if they did care about the secondary market they'd do more or less what they're doing now, aren't you?
Wizards will make a MM2 but I don't think it will have the Goyf/Bob/Clique Mythics from the last MM1. I mean, if they just take all the mythics from the last MM then MM2 will basically be the same with a few rares/uncommons being reprinted people need. Id rather see Snapcaster/Liliana/Mox Opal/Emrakul/Swords being reprinted. Goyf got the reprint it needed in MM1. Wizards shouldn't reprint something just for the sake of reprinting it. If that were the case then we would see these powerful cards in standard.
I would expect MM2 to have a completely different list of rares/mythics in it. Id expect Exalted, Metalcraft, and Landfall to be supported themes not only for draft reasons but for reprints. I don't think we will see Scry come back, so no Serum Visions. I don't think we will see shock lands or anything in RTR. Reprinting anything in RTR block in a set like MM would just crash prices. Abrupt Decay is the best card in the set and is 12 dollars. If it were announced to be in MM2 with the other uncounterable cycle cards, I bet it would drop to 5. Wizards wants cards to be worth cracking packs. If Goyf was suddenly worth 20 dollars then people would have no reason to buy packs with him when they can just go online and find some.
I personally believe Goyf is a fair card with a fair price. I own none. I need none. You don't need them for modern unless youre playing Jund/Rock/TarmoTwin/Zoo and if you are playing those decks the Goyf's shouldn't be out of your price range.
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Nice long winded answer without actually knowing why they reprinted those expensive cards. As you can clearly see modern masters 2 did nothing to elevate the extraordinary high prices of modern cards. They do not want cards that cost that much. 100 bucks is to much for a card in a format that they are supporting. They will reprint tarmogoyf because they have to its to expensive.
WotC does not care about the secondary market value of cards.
Yeah, they kind of do. They recognize that cards need to stay below a certain price to keep growth of a format sustainable. They also care about the secondary market because chase expensive cards that you have to buy sell sets and make Wizards money.
No they do not, because of two very simple reasons: 1#: They make no money of the secondary market. 2#: Caring about the secondary market would severely limit which cards they can reprint, which in turn is very bad for the older formats. Just look at the eternal formats as an example (Vintage and Legacy foremost) and see how difficult it is for people to afford to play them and stand a chance. Show me a man that can afford to buy any of the original moxes or a black lotus, and I'll show you a man who is wealthy.
What about cards that aren't on the reserve list? Show me a man who can afford to buy a full set of Portal Three Kingdoms and so on. If they truly didn't care about it they'd just go ahead and print Imperial Seal and Capture of Jingzhou all over the place. When they do things like this, they keep the supply limited as they did in Modern Masters 1. They're clearly trying to strike a balance between making cards available to those who don't have them and preserving the value for people who already do. I mean, you're pretty much saying that if they did care about the secondary market they'd do more or less what they're doing now, aren't you?
Except, you know, they keep reprinting those cards where they can. Some of the old cards not on the reserved list can't be reprinted in standard legal sets due to power issues. So they stick them in Auxiliary products when they can. For example, a substantial number of such old cards where reprinted in last years commander product, including a large number from P3K. And there where several such reprints of old cards to powerful for standard in Conspiracy as well. Basically, WotC reprint what they can, when they can. And once in a while, if the card in question follows the current color philosophy and isn't to powerful for standard, it shows up in an expert level (or even core) set.
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It's about time for the reserved list to die, for the sake of Vintage and Legacy (And Commander).
Except, you know, they keep reprinting those cards where they can. Some of the old cards not on the reserved list can't be reprinted in standard legal sets due to power issues. So they stick them in Auxiliary products when they can. For example, a substantial number of such old cards where reprinted in last years commander product, including a large number from P3K. And there where several such reprints of old cards to powerful for standard in Conspiracy as well. Basically, WotC reprint what they can, when they can. And once in a while, if the card in question follows the current color philosophy and isn't to powerful for standard, it shows up in an expert level (or even core) set.
No, they don't put them in side products "when they can", they do it much less frequently than that. The "large number" of P3K cards you mention was only 7. There was nothing stopping them from reprinting more than that, or reprinting something more expensive than Hua Tuo, Honored Physician. There was nothing stopping them from making Modern Masters an unlimited release. It is clear that they are attempting to reduce the price of overvalued cards, but it is equally clear that they are paying attention to the secondary market values and taking care not to rock the boat too much at once with respect to them. We get the odd card here and there, accompanied by many much cheaper reprints which cloud the waters for your analysis, but I'm still waiting on my Imperial Seal and I expect to be waiting a while yet. It's not because WotC couldn't possibly have squeezed it into Commander or Conspiracy, it's because they don't feel comfortable lopping six or seven hundred dollars off the price of a card overnight.
Except, you know, they keep reprinting those cards where they can. Some of the old cards not on the reserved list can't be reprinted in standard legal sets due to power issues. So they stick them in Auxiliary products when they can. For example, a substantial number of such old cards where reprinted in last years commander product, including a large number from P3K. And there where several such reprints of old cards to powerful for standard in Conspiracy as well. Basically, WotC reprint what they can, when they can. And once in a while, if the card in question follows the current color philosophy and isn't to powerful for standard, it shows up in an expert level (or even core) set.
No, they don't put them in side products "when they can", they do it much less frequently than that. The "large number" of P3K cards you mention was only 7. There was nothing stopping them from reprinting more than that, or reprinting something more expensive than Hua Tuo, Honored Physician. There was nothing stopping them from making Modern Masters an unlimited release. It is clear that they are attempting to reduce the price of overvalued cards, but it is equally clear that they are paying attention to the secondary market values and taking care not to rock the boat too much at once with respect to them. We get the odd card here and there, accompanied by many much cheaper reprints which cloud the waters for your analysis, but I'm still waiting on my Imperial Seal and I expect to be waiting a while yet. It's not because WotC couldn't possibly have squeezed it into Commander or Conspiracy, it's because they don't feel comfortable lopping six or seven hundred dollars off the price of a card overnight.
Modern Masters was a limited release because they weren't sure it would sell. Once they realized that it sold very well, they expanded the print run of Conspiracy considerably, and when that sold out, they made a second print run. And no, they can't just fill the auxiliary products with reprints of power cards, as they are intended to be balanced, and *fun to play*. This is why they only print a limited number of such cards in each such product.
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It's about time for the reserved list to die, for the sake of Vintage and Legacy (And Commander).
While I agree WOTC cares more about the secondary market than they sometimes admit, they did not limit MM solely because of their fear it wouldn't sell. If I remember correctly, First the reportedly said they were limiting it because they did not want another Chronicles, meaning they wanted people to have faith their collections wouldn't retain at least some value.
I'm personally of the opinion that Wizards could practically print anything they want and the old extremely rare cards from the limited sets, cards with historical significance to the game, and cards that are important staples in eternal formats, those cards will retain their value, and continue to rise, because collectibility of rarer and more historically significant versions of items is really in no way related to availability of newer, more common, less historically significant versions of same.
You can see signs of this everywhere. A Guttenberg Bible could sell for $30 million, while a modern printing can be found on any bookstore shelf in the world for $10. OK, OK, let's keep it to Magic the Gathering then... A textless Mutavault is $600 while you can buy the M14 printing for $15. Shivan Dragon is a $300 card in Alpha, and a 10 cent card in M14.
Tarmogoyf -- Look back at this post (I chose it because it reflected the history well, it seemed):
The new one will not be as expensive as the old one, I see the new one settling at around $50-60, maybe I'm wrong about the new price and maybe I'm right but the old ones will still retain their value IMO
ABUGAMES.com has lowered their buy price 5.00 since the announcement of the reprint. Sounds like there are a lot of people dumping theirs before they drop much more.
$120 ****in dollars for a ****in NM Tarmogoyf? DAMN, that price is INSANE even for them. You can get a NM one off scg for $100 a pop and tcg at $90 a pop. ABU is nuts!
So just before the announcement of the reprint, Goyf was about a $90 card. Now it's worth about double that, in either the old or the new printing.
They could probably double the supply of Jace, the Mind Sculptor's right now and within a year, it'll be worth more than it's worth today, because it'll just increase demand and you'll have more people playing Legacy with decks that want Jace. The original printings will easily hold their value if they give the new printings a different art, etc.
I just have a hard time believing that reprints have that much impact on card values except in cases where the cards had no business being that valuable to begin with. OK. Maybe if they printed a card like Noble Hierarch in the next 5 core sets in a row the way they used to overprint the heck out of Birds of Paradise it would fall to a 5 dollar card, but in all honesty, what would be the problem with even that kind of thing happening? It's not like it would drop in value by 50 bucks overnight, it would happen with each successive printing, and people who don't want to keep theirs and want to cash out as they see the price plummeting would have plenty of time to do that and get out without sinking too much unless they're just not paying attention and waiting for years to get on the ball.
Now, I'm sure I've said something incredibly stupid in here, so feel free to point it out haha. I haven't been following card values for very long, so it's still new territory for me.
While I agree WOTC cares more about the secondary market than they sometimes admit, they did not limit MM solely because of their fear it wouldn't sell. If I remember correctly, First the reportedly said they were limiting it because they did not want another Chronicles, meaning they wanted people to have faith their collections wouldn't retain at least some value.
And this is despite them knowing that the majority of the people who complained about chronicles weren't actually players, and their response to said complaining was a kneejerk reaction that has hurt the game in the long run. Funny how that works. >.<
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It's about time for the reserved list to die, for the sake of Vintage and Legacy (And Commander).
While I agree WOTC cares more about the secondary market than they sometimes admit, they did not limit MM solely because of their fear it wouldn't sell. If I remember correctly, First the reportedly said they were limiting it because they did not want another Chronicles, meaning they wanted people to have faith their collections wouldn't retain at least some value.
And this is despite them knowing that the majority of the people who complained about chronicles weren't actually players, and their response to said complaining was a kneejerk reaction that has hurt the game in the long run. Funny how that works. >.<
Chronicles was bad for the game. Reprints on that scale shouldn't happen because it limits future options. The Elder Dragons could hold a lot value and players would want them reprinted if they were currently a $10 card. But because of Chronicles, they have no value. Wizards basically threw away a valuable long term commidity for short term profits. I agree they overreacted with the reserve list, and it is equally bad, if not worse, for the game. MM was a compromise, and personally, I think it was near perfect. It drastically reduced the prices of most cards, but the cards that have long term value did retain some of that value (Doubling Season) so that future products are still possible. The 'got etc. issue is a problem, but will be rectified in the future. Reprint it enough and it will drop to a $70-$80 which is where it should be imo.
While I agree WOTC cares more about the secondary market than they sometimes admit, they did not limit MM solely because of their fear it wouldn't sell. If I remember correctly, First the reportedly said they were limiting it because they did not want another Chronicles, meaning they wanted people to have faith their collections wouldn't retain at least some value.
And this is despite them knowing that the majority of the people who complained about chronicles weren't actually players, and their response to said complaining was a kneejerk reaction that has hurt the game in the long run. Funny how that works. >.<
Chronicles was bad for the game. Reprints on that scale shouldn't happen because it limits future options. The Elder Dragons could hold a lot value and players would want them reprinted if they were currently a $10 card. But because of Chronicles, they have no value. Wizards basically threw away a valuable long term commidity for short term profits. I agree they overreacted with the reserve list, and it is equally bad, if not worse, for the game. MM was a compromise, and personally, I think it was near perfect. It drastically reduced the prices of most cards, but the cards that have long term value did retain some of that value (Doubling Season) so that future products are still possible. The 'got etc. issue is a problem, but will be rectified in the future. Reprint it enough and it will drop to a $70-$80 which is where it should be imo.
Except you know, it actually wasn't bad for the game at all. It's only real problem, outside of with collectors, was that it was done way to soon. If they had waited a few years, say in '98 rather than the year after legends was printed, I doubt there would have been the same backlash against it. And as I mentioned in my previous post: The vast majority of the people who complained weren't players but collectors. The perceived value of the cards on the secondary market has absolutely zero impact on the playability of the game. And the Reserved List has hurt the game to such an extent that it is nearly impossible for the average player to even afford to play the eternal formats, because a number of needed cards for those formats (such as the duals for example) are so prohibitively expensive that most people outside of collectors can't even afford them.
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It's about time for the reserved list to die, for the sake of Vintage and Legacy (And Commander).
The perceived value of cards on the market drives whether WOTC will print a set like Modern Masters. If cards hold no inherent value, then the set is only going to sell if it ridiculously fun to draft, and even then, WOTC couldn't get $6.99 a pack (or the inflated price they sold to distributors). MM was fun to draft, and sets like it are good for the game because it provides breaks from the monotony of the block structure. That is good for the game, but if the cards have no value, WOTC can't make money because people won't buy the product, and the product doesn't get made. Every card WOTC prints is a future commodity that it can reprint if the demand is there. Part of demand is price. If a card doesn't hold value, WOTC loses money, and the community loses cool sets to draft.
You are focusing on the wrong issue, collectors. If you notice, I never mentioned how collectors lost money because of Chronicles. WOTC lost out on future profits because of Chronicles. That's why it was bad for the game. It also just happened to had a secondary effect of the reserve list, which was also bad for the game. They are not going to overprint cards in the future. If they had done a larger print run of MM how much would Life From the Liam be worth right now? Doubling Season? Kataki? With their current value and the face that some will fall out of circulation, WOTC has ensured that they can still put them in future sets, and people will be relatively happy to open them. If you tank their value, you can't reprint them in the future.
Modern Masters was a limited release because they weren't sure it would sell. Once they realized that it sold very well, they expanded the print run of Conspiracy considerably, and when that sold out, they made a second print run.
If you read Aaron Forsythe's article you'll notice that he doesn't say that at all, the closest thing he says is "If the set works and accomplishes what we want — more Modern players — we'll contemplate making another set like it some time down the road." which is not the same thing as being unsure of its popularity, it's being unsure of its popularity within a particular subset of the fanbase. He also says "We don't want to turn cards from scarce to abundant in the blink of an eye, but we do want to alter the availability by a matter of degrees, all with the goal of growing the reach of the Modern format." which is pretty much exactly what I claimed WotC was attempting to do re: overvalued cards. You're confused about the timeline with Modern Masters, I can't figure out why you think they couldn't have done a second print run of that, instead being forced to fill demand for Modern Masters a year later through a completely different product. That makes no sense. Conspiracy was reprinted because it sold well. The same could have been done for Modern Masters, but they chose not to.
And no, they can't just fill the auxiliary products with reprints of power cards, as they are intended to be balanced, and *fun to play*. This is why they only print a limited number of such cards in each such product.
There is a huge amount of space between printing overvalued cards (not "power cards". Look how broken Hua Tuo is, right?) and "fill[ing] the auxilary products" with them. They are nowhere near to maximum capacity and they are even further from maximum efficiency. Imperial Seal would not have prevented any of the Commander decks from being "fun to play" or even to play against for that matter. What it would have done would be to amplify the True-Name Nemesis effect, or to replace it. I believe that Imperial Seal will be reprinted in due time but it's not a matter of filling one of the seven slots out of five hundred that you seem to think makes sense as a practical limit on P3K reprints. There are so few because they don't want to crash too many prices at once, not because Rolling Earthquake is just way too good for Commander.
As much as I think Goyf, Bob, and Clique need another round of reprints, I'd rather they utilize a potential Modern Masters 2 to reprint a new slew of cards that could also really use it, like LotV and Snapcaster Mage. In a perfect world, they'd do a new round of mythics in MM2 with Goyf, Bob, and Clique as rares, but somehow I can't see that happening.
As for the wasting-five-mythic-slots-to-play-things-safe-cycle to replace the Kamigawa Spirit Dragons, I hope they go with the Titans. They're not particularly desirable pulls either (except maybe PrimeTime) but at least they're iconic, splashy, and fun.
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Yeah, they kind of do. They recognize that cards need to stay below a certain price to keep growth of a format sustainable. They also care about the secondary market because chase expensive cards that you have to buy sell sets and make Wizards money.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
That's pretty obvious... put super desirable card in set, put set in boosters, watch booster/box sales go wild.
Also, the more people who can access the game at all levels, the less people who leave the game and stop buying product through frustration of being beaten by guys who have $10,000 decks.
At the end of the day, it all boils down to selling boosters.
No they do not, because of two very simple reasons: 1#: They make no money of the secondary market. 2#: Caring about the secondary market would severely limit which cards they can reprint, which in turn is very bad for the older formats. Just look at the eternal formats as an example (Vintage and Legacy foremost) and see how difficult it is for people to afford to play them and stand a chance. Show me a man that can afford to buy any of the original moxes or a black lotus, and I'll show you a man who is wealthy.
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Pascite draconem, evolvite aut morimini.
What about cards that aren't on the reserve list? Show me a man who can afford to buy a full set of Portal Three Kingdoms and so on. If they truly didn't care about it they'd just go ahead and print Imperial Seal and Capture of Jingzhou all over the place. When they do things like this, they keep the supply limited as they did in Modern Masters 1. They're clearly trying to strike a balance between making cards available to those who don't have them and preserving the value for people who already do. I mean, you're pretty much saying that if they did care about the secondary market they'd do more or less what they're doing now, aren't you?
I would expect MM2 to have a completely different list of rares/mythics in it. Id expect Exalted, Metalcraft, and Landfall to be supported themes not only for draft reasons but for reprints. I don't think we will see Scry come back, so no Serum Visions. I don't think we will see shock lands or anything in RTR. Reprinting anything in RTR block in a set like MM would just crash prices. Abrupt Decay is the best card in the set and is 12 dollars. If it were announced to be in MM2 with the other uncounterable cycle cards, I bet it would drop to 5. Wizards wants cards to be worth cracking packs. If Goyf was suddenly worth 20 dollars then people would have no reason to buy packs with him when they can just go online and find some.
I personally believe Goyf is a fair card with a fair price. I own none. I need none. You don't need them for modern unless youre playing Jund/Rock/TarmoTwin/Zoo and if you are playing those decks the Goyf's shouldn't be out of your price range.
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
Except, you know, they keep reprinting those cards where they can. Some of the old cards not on the reserved list can't be reprinted in standard legal sets due to power issues. So they stick them in Auxiliary products when they can. For example, a substantial number of such old cards where reprinted in last years commander product, including a large number from P3K. And there where several such reprints of old cards to powerful for standard in Conspiracy as well. Basically, WotC reprint what they can, when they can. And once in a while, if the card in question follows the current color philosophy and isn't to powerful for standard, it shows up in an expert level (or even core) set.
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Numquam evolutioni obstes. Solum conculceris.
Pascite draconem, evolvite aut morimini.
No, they don't put them in side products "when they can", they do it much less frequently than that. The "large number" of P3K cards you mention was only 7. There was nothing stopping them from reprinting more than that, or reprinting something more expensive than Hua Tuo, Honored Physician. There was nothing stopping them from making Modern Masters an unlimited release. It is clear that they are attempting to reduce the price of overvalued cards, but it is equally clear that they are paying attention to the secondary market values and taking care not to rock the boat too much at once with respect to them. We get the odd card here and there, accompanied by many much cheaper reprints which cloud the waters for your analysis, but I'm still waiting on my Imperial Seal and I expect to be waiting a while yet. It's not because WotC couldn't possibly have squeezed it into Commander or Conspiracy, it's because they don't feel comfortable lopping six or seven hundred dollars off the price of a card overnight.
Modern Masters was a limited release because they weren't sure it would sell. Once they realized that it sold very well, they expanded the print run of Conspiracy considerably, and when that sold out, they made a second print run. And no, they can't just fill the auxiliary products with reprints of power cards, as they are intended to be balanced, and *fun to play*. This is why they only print a limited number of such cards in each such product.
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Numquam evolutioni obstes. Solum conculceris.
Pascite draconem, evolvite aut morimini.
Check out http://www.mtgbrodeals.com/author/john-murphy/ for my EDH articles!
You can see signs of this everywhere. A Guttenberg Bible could sell for $30 million, while a modern printing can be found on any bookstore shelf in the world for $10. OK, OK, let's keep it to Magic the Gathering then... A textless Mutavault is $600 while you can buy the M14 printing for $15. Shivan Dragon is a $300 card in Alpha, and a 10 cent card in M14.
Tarmogoyf -- Look back at this post (I chose it because it reflected the history well, it seemed):
So just before the announcement of the reprint, Goyf was about a $90 card. Now it's worth about double that, in either the old or the new printing.
Hua Tuo, Honored Physician is a $50 card from P3K, a 50 cent card in Commander 2013.
They could probably double the supply of Jace, the Mind Sculptor's right now and within a year, it'll be worth more than it's worth today, because it'll just increase demand and you'll have more people playing Legacy with decks that want Jace. The original printings will easily hold their value if they give the new printings a different art, etc.
I just have a hard time believing that reprints have that much impact on card values except in cases where the cards had no business being that valuable to begin with. OK. Maybe if they printed a card like Noble Hierarch in the next 5 core sets in a row the way they used to overprint the heck out of Birds of Paradise it would fall to a 5 dollar card, but in all honesty, what would be the problem with even that kind of thing happening? It's not like it would drop in value by 50 bucks overnight, it would happen with each successive printing, and people who don't want to keep theirs and want to cash out as they see the price plummeting would have plenty of time to do that and get out without sinking too much unless they're just not paying attention and waiting for years to get on the ball.
Now, I'm sure I've said something incredibly stupid in here, so feel free to point it out haha. I haven't been following card values for very long, so it's still new territory for me.
And this is despite them knowing that the majority of the people who complained about chronicles weren't actually players, and their response to said complaining was a kneejerk reaction that has hurt the game in the long run. Funny how that works. >.<
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Numquam evolutioni obstes. Solum conculceris.
Pascite draconem, evolvite aut morimini.
Chronicles was bad for the game. Reprints on that scale shouldn't happen because it limits future options. The Elder Dragons could hold a lot value and players would want them reprinted if they were currently a $10 card. But because of Chronicles, they have no value. Wizards basically threw away a valuable long term commidity for short term profits. I agree they overreacted with the reserve list, and it is equally bad, if not worse, for the game. MM was a compromise, and personally, I think it was near perfect. It drastically reduced the prices of most cards, but the cards that have long term value did retain some of that value (Doubling Season) so that future products are still possible. The 'got etc. issue is a problem, but will be rectified in the future. Reprint it enough and it will drop to a $70-$80 which is where it should be imo.
Check out http://www.mtgbrodeals.com/author/john-murphy/ for my EDH articles!
Except you know, it actually wasn't bad for the game at all. It's only real problem, outside of with collectors, was that it was done way to soon. If they had waited a few years, say in '98 rather than the year after legends was printed, I doubt there would have been the same backlash against it. And as I mentioned in my previous post: The vast majority of the people who complained weren't players but collectors. The perceived value of the cards on the secondary market has absolutely zero impact on the playability of the game. And the Reserved List has hurt the game to such an extent that it is nearly impossible for the average player to even afford to play the eternal formats, because a number of needed cards for those formats (such as the duals for example) are so prohibitively expensive that most people outside of collectors can't even afford them.
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Numquam evolutioni obstes. Solum conculceris.
Pascite draconem, evolvite aut morimini.
You are focusing on the wrong issue, collectors. If you notice, I never mentioned how collectors lost money because of Chronicles. WOTC lost out on future profits because of Chronicles. That's why it was bad for the game. It also just happened to had a secondary effect of the reserve list, which was also bad for the game. They are not going to overprint cards in the future. If they had done a larger print run of MM how much would Life From the Liam be worth right now? Doubling Season? Kataki? With their current value and the face that some will fall out of circulation, WOTC has ensured that they can still put them in future sets, and people will be relatively happy to open them. If you tank their value, you can't reprint them in the future.
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If you read Aaron Forsythe's article you'll notice that he doesn't say that at all, the closest thing he says is "If the set works and accomplishes what we want — more Modern players — we'll contemplate making another set like it some time down the road." which is not the same thing as being unsure of its popularity, it's being unsure of its popularity within a particular subset of the fanbase. He also says "We don't want to turn cards from scarce to abundant in the blink of an eye, but we do want to alter the availability by a matter of degrees, all with the goal of growing the reach of the Modern format." which is pretty much exactly what I claimed WotC was attempting to do re: overvalued cards. You're confused about the timeline with Modern Masters, I can't figure out why you think they couldn't have done a second print run of that, instead being forced to fill demand for Modern Masters a year later through a completely different product. That makes no sense. Conspiracy was reprinted because it sold well. The same could have been done for Modern Masters, but they chose not to.
There is a huge amount of space between printing overvalued cards (not "power cards". Look how broken Hua Tuo is, right?) and "fill[ing] the auxilary products" with them. They are nowhere near to maximum capacity and they are even further from maximum efficiency. Imperial Seal would not have prevented any of the Commander decks from being "fun to play" or even to play against for that matter. What it would have done would be to amplify the True-Name Nemesis effect, or to replace it. I believe that Imperial Seal will be reprinted in due time but it's not a matter of filling one of the seven slots out of five hundred that you seem to think makes sense as a practical limit on P3K reprints. There are so few because they don't want to crash too many prices at once, not because Rolling Earthquake is just way too good for Commander.
As for the wasting-five-mythic-slots-to-play-things-safe-cycle to replace the Kamigawa Spirit Dragons, I hope they go with the Titans. They're not particularly desirable pulls either (except maybe PrimeTime) but at least they're iconic, splashy, and fun.