Actually it totally was. He did have different lines available you realise. PSully needed to put him at 9 so that the vortex trigger threatened to put him at 7 - which increases significantly the number of card combinations that win instantly - so by taking the line he did, PSully forced the pridemage sacrifice.
The point is that if he has Bolt then he could just kill him immediately. The Maverick player made a blatant mistake of not knowing that there is effectively no difference between going to 3 and going to 1.
Good players don't make bad decks good, they just make them better.
1) You cast a spell. You then get priority.
2) You may then choose to exile the spell or not. If you do not, then...
3) You opponent gets priority. If your opponent passes priority without doing anything...
4) Your spell resolves.
It doesn't seem quite as good since you can't play a spell you have every intention of feeding to the elemental to try and draw out counters. I'm not sure that would ever come up though...
Yeah, it'd just be a bonus for spells that you really want to resolve that they will actually want to counter, like an overloaded Mizzium Mortars. The real problem is when you cast a spell, immediately exile it, and they have a removal spell for the Nivmagus Elemental.
Between 50% and 75% of the price for the singles would be a reasonable range to expect, based on my experience. There aren't a lot of people looking to buy whole decks, so a lot of it is having patience and finding a buyer. Assuming you're going with eBay, I'd probably list it Buy It Now at $250 and do the Best Offer feature, then auto-accept any offer over $200.
The auto-accept feature makes very little sense, unless you have hundreds of listings and not the time to accept or deny each offer. Why auto-accept a $200 offer when someone could come along 10 minutes later and offer $210?
But I think $150-$200 for this deck seems reasonable.
We'll see. A lot has changed from shards block. Prices on normal rares typically don't get that high. Even ones that see play in multiple top decks. The only real exceptions are ones that see play in multiple decks in multiple formats. A card like this will likely only be in one deck a format.
Cheers
Yeah, this is really amazing to me. There could easily be an initial shortage on RTR, but pre-order prices like these for rares is just absurd...
SCG currently has 24 rares available for sale and of those, 11 cost $4 or more. The total value of those 11 cards is $110. Assuming RTR has roughly the same number of rares as Innistrad (59) then the rares from RTR will average almost $2 each, based on those 11 cards alone!
Some input from someone who has made some RtR preorders-
Finally, an expert chimes in...
I honestly don't agree with any of your specs, simply because there cannot be that much value in a set. Yes, new cards are cool, but for a random rare to be $5, it has to be highly played.
@AEIOUsometimesY: Yeah, I was just comparing rares, the point being that a couple of expensive mythics eventually soak up a lot of the set's value. The remaining three cards you mentioned means that Zendikar pretty much aligns with the pattern I noticed.
And I mentioned this in the shock land thread, but the fetches were one time printings that are used in all formats, whereas shocks are reprints that aren't played in Eternal* formats.
This set will be massively cracked. The non-shockland rares will have a hard time staying above $5 after the dust settles. New Jace IMO is pretty good. At least the best blue walker in standard so far. Preorders should be 30-40. Whether it tanks or shoots up is something we'll find out later based on standard play.
I agree, but I'll include some data to help clarify the point. Here are the non-rotating rares worth $5 or more according to TCGPlayer low:
M13
Talrand, Sky Summoner
Thragtusk
Avacyn Restored
Cavern of Souls
Restoration Angel
Dark Ascension
None
Innistrad
Isolated Chapel
Snapcaster Mage
And it's not like there were a ton of cards that were close; almost everything is less than $1. The trend seems to be 5 or so $3+ rares per set, a couple $15+ mythics, and 40+ bulk rares.
Given that there are 5 guaranteed $5-10 rares in RTR, I don't think that leaves much room for anything else.
Some of the lesser ones are already back down to $10. The Zendikar fetchlands had uses in all formats, were one time printings from a big set, and only cost $10-15. I'd say $5 for the lesser ones and $10 for the expensive ones doesn't seem farfetched at all.
And internationally, kidicarus marks the value at a small amount without the buyer even asking for it. You'll never have your cards hold at customs. International buyer's joy.
Well, that's fraud. Surprised a big time seller (with legions of fans, as shown by this thread) would take that risk.
I stopped buying from them a long time ago just because of the combined shipping policy. They used to charge $1 per extra auction won. One time I bought about 13 auctions at once, got charged $14 for shipping and had the package arrive with about $3 worth of postage on it.
In game EDIT: I see that they've changed it to $0.50 per extra auction won, with a $6 cap on shipping, which is much more reasonable. I'm guessing they had to lower the shipping to maintain top-rated seller status.
Elvish Archdruid P1P1 makes no sense to me. There are two better green cards in the pack (three if you count Flinthoof as "green") and you're sending weak signals. I'd still probably go with Primadox and build around it a bit, taking Visionary a little higher than usual, and if the Flinthoof happens to wheel then you'll be looking good.
Turn to Slag is my next pick to avoid the overwhelming green in the pack, but it's only an average removal spell.
Its not quite an alter and I didn't paint this one, but damned if I'm not excited to show it off and bring it home for the alter community:
Thanks to wotc and Pastimes for lining up these awesome paintings as prizes for the Legacy and Vintage Championships at Gencon, and to Chris Rahn for painting a sweet, sweet Brainstorm!
Wow, is that you? I didn't know we had any alterists that are actually good players too.
You just need to find the right dealers. Most of the larger dealers (SCG, Trollandtoad, etc) care enough about their reputation and customer's selling experience that things like non-payment are not a problem.
Well the point is that we're not not in the habit of selling to the stores you named because their buy prices are generally pretty bad. Smaller (and sometimes blatantly less reputable) stores have to offer better buy prices to compete, and they are the ones that will sometimes mess with you. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
Northern Paladin and Southern Paladin (The beta and weatherlight pictures)
have always looked like actors to me, but I can never put a name on which people they remind me of.
The point is that if he has Bolt then he could just kill him immediately. The Maverick player made a blatant mistake of not knowing that there is effectively no difference between going to 3 and going to 1.
Good players don't make bad decks good, they just make them better.
Yeah, it'd just be a bonus for spells that you really want to resolve that they will actually want to counter, like an overloaded Mizzium Mortars. The real problem is when you cast a spell, immediately exile it, and they have a removal spell for the Nivmagus Elemental.
The auto-accept feature makes very little sense, unless you have hundreds of listings and not the time to accept or deny each offer. Why auto-accept a $200 offer when someone could come along 10 minutes later and offer $210?
But I think $150-$200 for this deck seems reasonable.
Yeah, this is really amazing to me. There could easily be an initial shortage on RTR, but pre-order prices like these for rares is just absurd...
SCG currently has 24 rares available for sale and of those, 11 cost $4 or more. The total value of those 11 cards is $110. Assuming RTR has roughly the same number of rares as Innistrad (59) then the rares from RTR will average almost $2 each, based on those 11 cards alone!
Finally, an expert chimes in...
I honestly don't agree with any of your specs, simply because there cannot be that much value in a set. Yes, new cards are cool, but for a random rare to be $5, it has to be highly played.
And I mentioned this in the shock land thread, but the fetches were one time printings that are used in all formats, whereas shocks are reprints that aren't played in Eternal* formats.
*what do we call just Vintage and Legacy now?
I agree, but I'll include some data to help clarify the point. Here are the non-rotating rares worth $5 or more according to TCGPlayer low:
M13
Talrand, Sky Summoner
Thragtusk
Avacyn Restored
Cavern of Souls
Restoration Angel
Dark Ascension
None
Innistrad
Isolated Chapel
Snapcaster Mage
And it's not like there were a ton of cards that were close; almost everything is less than $1. The trend seems to be 5 or so $3+ rares per set, a couple $15+ mythics, and 40+ bulk rares.
Given that there are 5 guaranteed $5-10 rares in RTR, I don't think that leaves much room for anything else.
Some of the lesser ones are already back down to $10. The Zendikar fetchlands had uses in all formats, were one time printings from a big set, and only cost $10-15. I'd say $5 for the lesser ones and $10 for the expensive ones doesn't seem farfetched at all.
But yeah, since one of the formats is cube, I'm going with LSV.
Well, that's fraud. Surprised a big time seller (with legions of fans, as shown by this thread) would take that risk.
I stopped buying from them a long time ago just because of the combined shipping policy. They used to charge $1 per extra auction won. One time I bought about 13 auctions at once, got charged $14 for shipping and had the package arrive with about $3 worth of postage on it.
In game EDIT: I see that they've changed it to $0.50 per extra auction won, with a $6 cap on shipping, which is much more reasonable. I'm guessing they had to lower the shipping to maintain top-rated seller status.
Turn to Slag is my next pick to avoid the overwhelming green in the pack, but it's only an average removal spell.
Wow, is that you? I didn't know we had any alterists that are actually good players too.
Congratulations!
Well the point is that we're not not in the habit of selling to the stores you named because their buy prices are generally pretty bad. Smaller (and sometimes blatantly less reputable) stores have to offer better buy prices to compete, and they are the ones that will sometimes mess with you. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
Northern Paladin = Aaron Eckhart
Liliana of the Veil = Cameron Diaz