Ravnica again? Excellent. So many RTR Block cards are in my deck. :]
Yeah, they are alluding to returning to Ravnica again since Bolas is aiming for the place and they just mind wiped vraska into being a sleeper agent or something and had her walk back through the portal to the place. At this point Dominaria is a dismal backwater plane and Ravnica is what Dominaria probably could have become if it didn't get blown apart by all the conflicts.
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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!
Honestly, I'm just getting tired of being stressed out due to trying to keep ahead of spiking prices on the secondary market. It's absolutely ridiculous how horrible it is to try to play the game when 3rd party vendors hold sway over card prices and wizards is too busy living in their own daisy fields to care. Oh, people are playing Liliana of the Veil, so we'll reprint it at mythic in a limited run set at 240 msrp. Yes, that will increase the availability or help us create chase cards to sell our booster boxes when the reason the boxes don't seem to ever completely evaporate off shelves is due to the MSRP being too high.
This company is so off the rails that I doubt they even comprehend the damage they are inflicting on the game with how they are distributing and reprinting cards. This is going beyond anything the games industry in general is doing with loot boxes: This is outright ignoring the world they created and failing to support the very dream they are trying to usher in. You have singles vendors literally fighting tooth and nail with players and speculators to the point that both parties have to become speculators just to stay alive, LGS are being crushed by online box sales that go for as much as 25-30% below retail all year around, and this has become the norm at this point. Buy a Box promo cards have been underwhelming and they never have enough of them, on top of which the way those are distributed allows vendors to withhold and sell them later separately since they don't have to break open the boxes to get them. Set design has been horrific for the last couple of sets with very few redeeming qualities, and the best set they've released to date has been a freaking Un-set.
Lack of good foils, full art non-land cards, poor quality card printings, excessive msrp on booster boxes, and being overly greedy and hurting everyone except for tournament grinders has been the story of MtG since I got back to playing for the last 3 years. This is just completely insane. People should not be feeling like price is a barrier to building the deck they want to make, yet here we are, fully grown adults with jobs, and we are legitimately complaining about the prices on cards in the game. Why this game has not imploded in on itself is a mystery to me.
I'm going to say this right now: by all means, this game should legitimately be dead right now. There is no way that the average TCG could survive the kind of bad decision making this company has made over such an extended period of time. The only reason MtG is alive right now, is by the sheer tenacity of the players wanting the game to stay alive and the company has gone to abusing this relationship and cashing in off the people who love the game. By extension, this same selfish greed has spread to the other parts of the ecosystem such as the distribution and point of purchase. Thankfully the point of purchase end for consumers is the least problematic.
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!
Standard's pricing is whats killing it. Look at how ridiculous Kumena, Tyrant of Orazca 's pricing is. I doubt its because of casual or Modern apeal because Archangel Avacyn and Dragonlord Ojutai also reached or surpassed this pricing. So manye xpensive cards to build a deck that wil get outdated in a couple of months its just not worth the investment anymore. I'm sure you can brew budget decks but not everyone wants to use those type of decks and wants to use more expensive cards that suits their taste and styles more.
Not just pricing though is it? I can afford to play Standard- I am at the point of storing Mtg in safes rather than trade files- and I don't even own power 9, but I do own 20 Legacy decks, I can afford to play Standard. I just don't want to, because everything I ever enjoyed about the game has been removed from it. I will happily loan out dual lands and Tabernacles, I would not loan out a single common to a player wishing to enter a Standard event. I hate the format and want it to die in its current iteration, along with the current design paradigms.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
Standard's pricing is whats killing it. Look at how ridiculous Kumena, Tyrant of Orazca 's pricing is. I doubt its because of casual or Modern apeal because Archangel Avacyn and Dragonlord Ojutai also reached or surpassed this pricing. So manye xpensive cards to build a deck that wil get outdated in a couple of months its just not worth the investment anymore. I'm sure you can brew budget decks but not everyone wants to use those type of decks and wants to use more expensive cards that suits their taste and styles more.
Not just pricing though is it? I can afford to play Standard- I am at the point of storing Mtg in safes rather than trade files- and I don't even own power 9, but I do own 20 Legacy decks, I can afford to play Standard. I just don't want to, because everything I ever enjoyed about the game has been removed from it. I will happily loan out dual lands and Tabernacles, I would not loan out a single common to a player wishing to enter a Standard event. I hate the format and want it to die in its current iteration, along with the current design paradigms.
The only standard I truly enjoyed was probably Eldrich moon because of the spirits deck basically being a version of fairies. This standard has turned into just aggro decks, decks that want to rely on energy work arounds to fix mana, and control decks running on hail mary style play. I literally haven't played standard in paper for ages and have mostly just been brewing and trying to figure out what kind of strategies are viable each push. I've gotten some games in via freebie services, but that's about it outside of some limited games, which I mostly just play to appease some friends.
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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!
People should not be feeling like price is a barrier to building the deck they want to make, yet here we are, fully grown adults with jobs, and we are legitimately complaining about the prices on cards in the game. Why this game has not imploded in on itself is a mystery to me.
Because lots of other people (like me, or drmarkb) are not complaining about price.
People should not be feeling like price is a barrier to building the deck they want to make, yet here we are, fully grown adults with jobs, and we are legitimately complaining about the prices on cards in the game. Why this game has not imploded in on itself is a mystery to me.
Because lots of other people (like me, or drmarkb) are not complaining about price.
The reality is that you are not lots of people and neither are your friends. For the vast majority of players they are being force into making a choice of getting a playable deck or a single card and those single cards in question are being actively pushed and advertised by a 1-5% competitive group meta. It's the same situation that happens in MMOs with the raiding community and it's why there's a gulf of nightmares on youtube along with near constant drama on reddit, as well as aggravating problems that already exist within the MTG Finance community and everyone else.
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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!
Thing is, complaints about cost are not legitimate.
"I want a Tesla Roadster, its not fair that its a $300,000 car."
Thats not legitimate, as I can instead just use the car I have, or buy a more affordable car.
It's more about who are you targeting with that price, and the answer is that the prices on the top end of Modern are too high for normal players. The reason the prices got to the way they are is due to the limited number of cards available and the fact that sponsored teams and grinders tend to have higher amounts of available money allocated to pay for the cards. So the pricing on the cards reflect the price that a small percentage of people are willing to pay rather than the actual value of the card to most people playing at fnm level. Case in point, Liliana of the Veil would be expensive no matter how much she got printed, but she definitely wouldn't be 100 usd if she were printed enough that players could actually get their copies. The only thing keeping more recent cards from going to such levels is the larger printing runs and lower card attrition due to time.
The damage this company has done to the game is just unbelievable. It's just from so many places such as the massive over saturation of the market place with bulk cards, over priced secondary products, standard being a disaster for multiple years. This entire philosophy of focusing on draft and limited design just does not work in this game at all. No one is pushing draft and sealed heavily at major tournaments. People watch constructed magic because that is where the most deck building freedom is present. I'm just hoping Richard can somehow salvage this game with Dominaria, but it sounds like he may be in a consulting position so who knows.
Also Masters 25 is now down to 174 a box preorder. I should have just waited at this point and saved 40 dollars.
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!
Please don't gild this post, I don't need and it got it on my last comment. I appreciate it but this isn't worth it. Much love though.
This is a long ass post, but rarely do I get to help others and use my paper knowledge all at once. There is a lot of information many might not care about. But if you care about this issue it will be an informative piece.
Mods - Please contact me if this post violates any rules. Not my intention to break any or hurt anyone.
As of right now I've decided to post information about my theory on why we are noticing diminished paper quality without revealing the exact brand and grade, at least as far as I know within the continental United States. I am sorry if this angers some people. Please realize that this seems insignificant but it matter. Maybe I will change my mind later, but the damage it can do to others and to me is too much. But I will thoroughly describe how I determined the current paper grade and WHY it matters in the diminished quality of the card stock. I will get in depth into the nature of the paper, and why I think WotC or their printer uses this stock. Maybe with a little bit of googling someone can find the information, it wouldn't be hard for anyone with printing experience, but I have stated my reasons why I am afraid to post the brand below. I mainly don't want people to be able to counterfeit the cards. Not because I care about WotC, but I don't want some young kid getting fakes traded to him or someone selling fakes, with the right equipment and exact stock I know for a fact these cards can be replicated to the point where, other than that little silver foil on rares, you would be hard pressed to tell which one is fake side by side.
I am posting this at the request of other people in regards to paper quality. I am putting myself at risk of negative exposure in the industry, but I feel as if my fellow magic consumers deserve to understand what I believe to be the reasons behind the diminishing quality of MTG cards and some insight into the paper industries struggles recently that lead to them. Some people here probably have a mortgage's down payment worth of cards, and buy more cards on the regular. You deserve to know these things. I love Magic, I may not have played constantly through my life, but every time I do I seem to enjoy it. From deckbuilding, battling with friends, teaching someone new, it's all a great experience. I don't want to turn anyone away with this info, but seeing as how it seems to be effecting high level play and performance, as well as long term durability of the product, I think it should be investigated.
To preface this, as others saw from my previous comment, I am a 10+ year paper salesman and owner of an independent paper company. My dad is a 38 year veteran, and my family has been in the printing and paper industry since 1865. I deal mainly in cut size and digital coated paper (8.5 x 11, 11 x 17, 12 x 18, 13 x19) and larger folio sheets (19 x 25 and above) for commercial printers, not rolls of paper, which I assume WotC uses, but the paper itself is the same. These rolls allow them to print huge runs at once on a machine and then the cards are cut later on. I don't know if this is exactly how they are done but to me it would make the most sense.
Please also bear with me, I may use the terms coated board or coated cover instead of card stock, which is the paper terminology for this stock printers use when I am selling them. Right away I can tell you the stock is much different that older cards, though I think even father back when i was a kid it was two sheets pressed around a blue sheet to stop counterfeiting. It is definitely a lower grade than I remember, maybe not less caliper or coating, just sheet density and rigidity is a lot lower, which could be on reason for curls, but I'll get to that later. It bends easily, the art doesn't have any "pop" to it. If people have access to a micrometer, if you want to mic out older sets and let me know your findings, I can research it next week when I get back to the office.
I started playing MTG in 1997, and played on and off every few years until 2015-2016. I recently got back into it because my youngest brother likes the game.
I have only tested cards from the most recent sets, and also some 2015 cards in my dresser, and all my 90's-2000's cards I have to find lol (hopefully somewhere since I have a Drop of Honey in there worth a lot now I am sure, as it's older than all my siblings), so I have only tested those as of now, with samples across an entire booster box of Rivals as well, I measured the thickness of rares, uncommon, commons, and tokens. One of the most discerning characteristics of coated board / cover is the thickness in thousandths of an inch I calipered it on manual calipers and come up just under 12pt, or .0012 of an inch thick, which is a a heavily used item in the industry of heavyweight coated papers. I assume they by in terms of caliper, to maintain consistency, and not basis weight (like 20# paper, coated covers have basis weights, but they are never the same as another companies, where caliper can get close enough). Average between my tests was 11.7-11.8pt, I have a digital caliper arriving next week as my last one was ancient so I can get a dead on measurement, and I don't have a way to measure GSM to an accurate amount without firing up an old digital press here and trying to run similar stock.
The next characteristic to try to determine the sheet would be how bright the sheet is. The brightness of the sheet is harder to determine, since even white cards are what I refer to as a "paint job", full card printing. I don't really have a white enough area or un-printed area of a card to eyeball it. Also, brightness grade is hard to determine by optics alone. For example, Xerox makes uncoated sheets called "100 bright" - its bluish white so some people think it is actually LESS bright than other sheets. Most copy paper is 92-96 bright. Coated paper isn't easy to do this, and everyone describe their perceptions differently. So to start I tried to remove definite impossibilities.
Its definitely not the old Carolina grade, which is my favorite coated board, 94 Brightness US made, since that was sold off to another mill and not made anymore. It isn't a Chinese sheet I am familiar with, because it is not the same coating and the Asian mill had a heavy duty / tariff placed upon them a few years ago, I doubt WotC's printer would be able to find that at the price point they need. It is definitely not Cast-Coated, called Kromekote, which is a super glossy sheet that uses clay to drink up ink, because that crap is over $1 per lb to the end user and you would know it right away if you saw it. So that leaves a few major mills, and even less of those make sheets with this caliper.
So to me, that narrows it down quite significantly. I can say with confidence that it is a domestic coated board, slightly under 12pt, what I might call a #3 grade in the industry. This is reinforced by the evidence of no drop in quality in Europe, who make some absolutely beautiful coated sheets. So it must be Asian, South American, or US made. My final paragraph describes why I am sure it must be Domestic. This particular brand is a famous US mill. Their other grades are really good sheets, especially in regards to large print runs and digital printing, two of the last major consumers of this item. One of their main plants is in the NE USA, but it is not their only plant. As I stated when I began, I am extremely hesitant to post the exact mill grade and brand name, since I am a paper supplier, and I get paper in other grades of this brand (not mill direct) and also because then anyone here with a digital printer and a cutting method could just start running their own cards.
Which I don't care how badly that hurts WotC, but I don't want to hurt shop owners, or have players trade for fakes, or buy fakes, none of that. Also, if their printer buys from a convertor and not mill direct, they might not even be told the brand, only the grade, thickness, and brightness. I would say I am about 95% sure of the mill. My father agrees with me as well. He's probably sold close to half a billion pounds of paper and envelopes in his career. But the paper industry is extremely political, I am an independent merchant, and my family is heavily disliked by other merchants because we don't salute their flag, if you know what I mean. This goes back decades. I don't know if it will even help anyone to know and may only hurt me. I definitely don't want to hurt anyone I buy from, and I don't want to dry snitch on anyone. But I will tell you what I know about this brand.
Now we get down to the reasons why the quality is going down. The brand is the lowest quality board this mill makes. To be frank, this paper sucks. From coated text for magazines, to coated board like this for cards, posters, whatever, it just doesn't perform. This is in terms of brightness, rigidity, sheet formation, the fibers they use, and running ability. At my buying power, as a medium size paper merchant, on the secondary market (surplus / job lot / wholesale / whatever you want to call it)I could obtain truckloads of this stock at around 31-32 cents per lb. all day in sheets. They buy in rolls (imagine toilet paper rolls as tall as the ceiling in your house, maybe 5-6 rolls equals a truckload, huge rolls) so say at most they pay .25 per lb., maybe less at their quantity.
They also may buy from large convertors to fit their presses rolls sizes. As one redditor messaged me, WotC might not even be aware of the crap they're being sent. But that isn't important to this issue, because the reasoning is cutting cost, whether its by them or their print house. Higher quality sheets of the same mill could be obtained for maybe 2 cents more, maybe less, if they did the legwork and had a good trucker. The only thing that would scare me on the supply side is credit, so I'd rather sell WotC than a commercial printer, because printers have bad credit and rarely pay within terms. I have some info on who their printer MAY be, but I'm not going to broadcast it because I have no proof. But back to the paper quality. My main customer base is smaller commercial printers, schools, mail houses, etc, mostly 2500lbs - 10000lbs tops. On coated paper I might charge them 56-60 cents per lb delivered to a loading dock for this item. I have a few truckload guys, but that's beside the point.
The point is that all but a fraction of my customer base will not want to use this grade from the mill. Their 2 higher grades sell like hot cakes, but this grade is the most commonly sold job lot grade and easy to find cheapo. Everyone else with even an ounce of paper knowledge generally won't run this stock. I don't even have any coated cover stock form this mill in 12pt to compare. I have some in text grade (soft paper for the layman) here but it is not going to compare well. The only people who like to print this paper from me are guys who do crap work paint jobs. Like I have one customer who prints for the Amish community, they don't care if the paper is from 1984. This paper quality won't only effect the feel of the card, but also how the printing quality is. It may not appear on every card, but the overall amount of defects and mistakes will increase. The highest grade of this mill will print and image amazingly even at long high speed runs.
In regards to curling, as it seems to be a point of contention here, I don't understand why the cards are curling as bad as they are. Coated paper is much more resistant to uncoated sheets, like copy paper or opaque sheets. They will absorb moisture much slower, and the only inherent moisture is locked inside the coating. My cards aren't old enough to curl, and I haven't seen major curling in my 2014 era cards. Foils seem to be a problem, and unless I knew more about how they foil them I dont want to make presumptions. Coated paper should not curl as quickly or as badly as people describe, the coating will keep moisture out to a degree, but some moisture is in the sheet before they coat it. I have paper here that is almost a decade old, and it's been through multiple warehouses and seasons, and the only paper that curls badly is uncoated regular paper and opaque paper. Coated sheets turn yellow before they curl in my experience. Perhaps if they are buying surplus sheets of this grade, the rolls aren't capped and wrapped and exposure is more severe, but if so, that is pretty cheap and amateur of the buyer.
The curling could be due to them buying rolls and them getting left on a warehouse floor for too long, where the paper is getting curled in the roll. I looked at a post today about foils, I don't know about the foils, one guy noted the friction may increase the curling. The most likely is that the less rigid paper is sitting in rolls and curling before it hits the press. Or its being exposed to extreme variations in temperature. But I mean extreme, because my warehouse is not climate controlled and I don't get these issues at all. Today might 10 degrees but July might be 80.
I could go on forever, but what I am saying is, if I was the paper buyer at MTG's printer, or at WotC, I would not buy this paper board for this application. But at the same time, I don't know the economics behind it, I don't know their costs or profit margins, but even for this grade of paper I think there are better alternatives. They would probably save that money on ink alone with the toner adhesion with the better grades from this SAME EXACT MILL. The amount they must print gives them a buying power within the industry that is probably unrivaled. The only people I can think of that uses the amount of board they use are political campaigns during a presidential election year. The problem that arises now is that the paper industry is seeing a major increase in pricing. This is a surprise to everyone in the industry. A lot of us salesman are unsure of whats to come, because an uptick in demand and a price increase don't have any reasoning behind them.
Paper usage in general has been declining since the advent of the internet and PDF. The main reasoning I can think of to as why WotC uses this grade of paper is that the alternative of a few years ago is gone. I think 3 years ago, not sure exactly, the US placed a high % tariff / duty, whatever they call it, on paper imported from countries accused of "dumping" paper here. As in, selling paper for a loss, at below established market value, to purposely hurt US mills. The countries of origin for these mills would subsidize the money lost in order to crush the US mills and establish these foreign brands within the printing industry. These mills included Chinese owned mills around Asia (the main culprit, which probably screwed the other countries doing this), some Portuguese and Brazilian mills, Australian mills, and I also believe Japanese mills. You can still find the paper surplus or through less than above board sources, but you cannot import it at the price point they would need or in the quantities they need. I feel bad saying this, but the Chinese board would be their best option, and probably what they were using until the duty hit.
Its high brightness, higher rigidity in the same caliper, and is packaged well. But they won't be able to . This duty will remain in effect for a few more years. The best US coated board, at least in my opinion, called Carolina, owned by a company called International Paper, was discontinued and the brand name sold to a company called Tango. It is neither of these sheets that is used to make cards. Therefore, it can be expected that all these issues regarding card stock quality will continue for at least a few more years in my opinion. What scares me is how much curling people are describing. With coated board that should not be happening as dramatically as others describe. Foils seem to be worse. Not sure why on that I need more information. I cannot definitively determine why this happening. All paper will curl, but EVENTUALLY. Not this quickly, not in this volume. The rigidity is also worrying. For tournament purposes and longevity purposes. I doubt a majority of people can tell, but magic cards from the 2000's and 90's were the same caliper (thickness in fractions of an inch) seems to be the same but the rigidity of the sheet is not. It bends easier, and that is not good. I don't know if seasoned players can use that to cheat or manipulate draws, etc. I have only played casual FNM, and a few real tournaments in High School (2000's).
I mainly post this because I know some people personally who have complained, and have seen many posts regarding this lurking on this sub. At first I thought it was a mistake or change in people perception. It would pain me to think that people here spent thousands of dollars, if not much more, on products not manufactured to endure the play they will see or be able to last as long as the older cards. WotC makes a lot of bread on Magic over the year, and have never scoffed at the opportunity to get players to open their wallets, so you all deserve to understand the forces behind the scenes. The average person would just call them cards, but to MTG players they are much more. These are not just tools of a game, but also a source of equity for a lot of people, and also sentimentality in collecting, viewing the art, lore, etc. I have to leave for the night but please feel free to add any input, I would like to hear others input or evidence so I can understand this issue even further.
I will end it at that. I could go on forever. Hopefully someone reads this and takes away something useful. And if you wanted me to disclose the brand I am sorry. There is enough information here to figure that out on your own with a little detective work. Good luck to you all.
I DO NOT WANT TO HELP PEOPLE EXACT DETERMINE PAPER GRADES AND QUALITY, PRINTING METHODS, OR WHERE TO OBTAIN THE STOCK BECAUSE I DO NOT WANT TO HELP COUNTERFEITERS. PLEASE DO NOT ASK ME ABOUT MACHINES THAT WILL PRINT THEM, HOW TO CUT THEM, ETC.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
It's more about who are you targeting with that price, and the answer is that the prices on the top end of Modern are too high for normal players. The reason the prices got to the way they are is due to the limited number of cards available and the fact that sponsored teams and grinders tend to have higher amounts of available money allocated to pay for the cards. So the pricing on the cards reflect the price that a small percentage of people are willing to pay rather than the actual value of the card to most people playing at fnm level. Case in point, Liliana of the Veil would be expensive no matter how much she got printed, but she definitely wouldn't be 100 usd if she were printed enough that players could actually get their copies.
First of, modern does not target normal players. it targets modern tournament players. So there is not much of a difference.
Also, i dont belive that everyone would have expensive lilianas if there were enough of them.
I know a collector who has over 40 lilis, everyone altered in a different way by the original artist.
If there were more lilianas, and they would be more affordable, he would buy more of them. Its not just the supply, its also the distribution among the players. And thats an effect i have often seen. Fetchlands are cheap? I know players who have several playsets of them, because they were cheap, still others have none, while they were still to expensive for them. But that dosn´t mean there aren´t enough around for anyone.
That's not actually true. Modern is a framework of legality that translates beyond tournament play to many play groups that are not necessarily into playing beyond FNM. These kinds of frameworks serve a couple of purposes, but above all else it assures that players are playing with cards that hypothetically are available readily among an unknown playgroup. Tournament play is a completely different beast from a format and is the TCG equivalent of end game raiding. It's highly competitive, typically has high stakes, and also due to the competitive nature starts to define a set of tools that are required in order to play and have the best chance of winning. In this case, the tools of the trade are cards, and the correct tools have to be analyzed and sifted out of the larger pool of cards available to play the game. Once these cards are identified, this is what gives those specific cards like Chalice of the Void and others their value. So when players are paying the price for one of these tools, they are actually paying a price based on the card being a tool in high level tournament play and are paying in access of the actual card worth for general play. In addition, because of the tournament play coverage it makes these cards appear far more desirable to players abroad, which is why you end up with someone having 40 lilianas and absolutely none to trade. The cards are just too universally desired to trade off, so they stay in peoples collections unless the meta shifts and those cards fall out of favor, whether from bannings or new cards entering the format.
This wouldn't be a problem if wizards reprinted the "tool" cards in order to allow players a way to obtain them fairly, such as through standard. The problem is that the way they are printing the cards is placing these as chase cards in over priced masters sets and never knock the value back down to earth.
And before we get into this further this entire system is being caused by a much deeper problem routed in our own society that is a problem an entire generation of people are going to have to deal with, namely my own generation and probably the one following in my footsteps.
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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!
If you are not playing 'tournament level play' why do you need the Tournament Level (and yes expensive) cards? You dont need Chalice in normal decks. You dont need Lilly, or Goyf, in kitchen table, or even FNM decks.
Its a complete non-starter of an issue.
I have put together RG budget decks that will kill you on Turn 3 Gold fish, and the most expensive card was Copperline Gorge because I had them sitting around.
If you are talking about casual players, then why are you conflating that with tournament level prices?
If you are not playing 'tournament level play' why do you need the Tournament Level (and yes expensive) cards? You dont need Chalice in normal decks. You dont need Lilly, or Goyf, in kitchen table, or even FNM decks.
Its a complete non-starter of an issue.
I have put together RG budget decks that will kill you on Turn 3 Gold fish, and the most expensive card was Copperline Gorge because I had them sitting around.
If you are talking about casual players, then why are you conflating that with tournament level prices?
I don't know Idsurge, why don't you go ask the lovely people at wizards that social engineered the requirements. Anyway, back to the Byakko grind.
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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!
Thing is, complaints about cost are not legitimate.
"I want a Tesla Roadster, its not fair that its a $300,000 car."
Thats not legitimate, as I can instead just use the car I have, or buy a more affordable car.
Not really a good comparison. Tesla Roadster was an ultra-luxury product that they only sold a few thousand copies of. The proper MTG analogy would be for someone to complain about how expensive something like a Blue Hurricane is, which as far as I know no one is doing.
Actually, now that I think about it, the Roadster was mostly a proof of concept thing, as it was replaced with the much cheaper Model S.
Care to explain how wizards social engineered 'requirements'? Requirements to what again?
Wizards isnt the one building Modern decks, they do that enough with their rail roaded, paint by numbers, Standard format.
There is intentional social engineering, and then there is "oh, people do that already so lets just take advantage of it and promote it" kind of engineering. The situation with modern tournaments and the effect it has on the general consumers playing modern is one of those latter types. They didn't actually start it, but once they realized it was there, well, that is how you got 240 msrp masters sets while people like yourself are happily paying the exorbitant prices on singles.
It also falls into that same category as knowing there are thousands of Hydroblast, yet listing them up for 2 dollars a pop 4 at a time and pretending they are limited supply. Everyone knows ice age commons are like a dime a dozen, yet now some guy who bought bulk collections of ice age can sell a single card they got probably a 1000 copies of for 2 dollars a piece?
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!
Thats....not engineering. And its certainly not Wizards 'engineering requirements' like you initially claimed...chalk it up to a Coltism I suppose.
All you are really complaining about here, is Capitalism. (Note, as Canadian I am by near default a filthy Socialist..so run with that how you will.)
Call it whatever you want. At the end of the day I"m tired of excuses like "people don't need goyfs at the kitchen table" because that is complete bollocks and you basically know it. That same phrase could be used with any single card regardless of cost and on top of which, you also don't need to play magic, but the point of the entire thing is people want to play magic and want to be able to access and build decks. Cards that are priced high simply because of a vendor based need to capitalize on grinders and sponsored teams is a problem. It's been a problem for a long time, and you laughing it off is not going to change that. Wizards should have been printing these cards through core sets or other means, but they instead axed core sets, pulled all value out of secondary products to fuel masters sets, and then over priced most of their secondary product line going to big box retail stores. s
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!
You dont though? It literally makes no difference to you unless you are running 'tournament level' decks against other tournament level decks...but at the kitchen table instead of FNM or Tournaments...
I mean honestly what do you want? $10 Goyfs? $15 Lilly?
You say its a problem, I say it isnt, and the game (Modern) continues to thrive...
EDIT: In fact, simply proxy it, it makes NO difference if you attribute no value to the cards, and you simply want to play those decks outside of a tournament.
GP Toronto had well over 1000 players (I think I heard 1600?) so...yeah Moderns fine.
You dont though? It literally makes no difference to you unless you are running 'tournament level' decks against other tournament level decks...but at the kitchen table instead of FNM or Tournaments...
I mean honestly what do you want? $10 Goyfs? $15 Lilly?
You say its a problem, I say it isnt, and the game (Modern) continues to thrive...
EDIT: In fact, simply proxy it, it makes NO difference if you attribute no value to the cards, and you simply want to play those decks outside of a tournament.
GP Toronto had well over 1000 players (I think I heard 1600?) so...yeah Moderns fine.
No my problem IdSurge is that you seem to think that I'm vouching for 10 dollar goyf and Lily, which is never going to happen realistically. What I'm saying is if they printed these cards to better meet demand they probably would be more around 35-50 usd, which is where the price should cap out.
Unfortunately, there's basically no way to undo the damage done on cards that legitimately should be around 10 dollars outside of a standard reprint, such as the mana-base. WoTC won't ever do that because the price of standard on pre-order would be too high for standard players just due to the mana alone, and by the time the price would crash down on cards like Scalding Tarn, they'd have an even bigger train wreck with standard than they already have right now. That's why a lot of people (myself included) think standard is a horrible plan if they are just supporting draft / limited.
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 think Lilly at 50 dollars is pushing it, but for many it would be a price they could pay. At 100, well that is a black mark for sure. Again we all know how close Lilly came to going through Std again, and had it done so it would be more reasonable. Standard really does get in the way of filtering needed reprints such as Thoughtseize in.
Its the 50 dollar-80 dollar Tarns that really, really annoy players though, there is no excuse for them.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
As I see it, MTG has two big problems that they need to address. Ultimately, what people play will come down to what their friends play and how they can play games in their free time. Tournaments and other big name events help with the promotion, but the game lives and dies on how the casual player can engage in the game, spending money when they want.
Problem #1, Magic is expensive and with how easy it is to net deck, even casual formats cost a boat load of money, especially as formats rotate. This means that as people become more competitive, they have to either shell out the cash or eventually get off the train because they get tired of loosing to whomever in their play group has the most cash. Standard costs $350 per deck and must be updated 4 times a year, so we'll be generous say standard costs $700 per year per deck assuming card sell back and some overlap in cards. Modern is about $1000, Legacy $2000. By comparison Pokemon is about $250 per deck and if you look at LCGs, Netrunner is $100 for a deck, but you can buy the whole card pool for $400 to $500. If we look at playing ONE draft per week and all the pre-release events for most of the year, that is $870 per year.
Problem #2, Magic's digital presence is terrible. MTGO's interface is terrible and it's UI is beyond dated. In addition, if someone chooses to play online as well as in paper, they are effectively paying twice for the same game AND the online game is cheaper in some aspects, but MTGO standard and modern decks cost only about $100 less than their paper equivalents. Instead of promoting playing the game more, having split formats between MTGO and paper means a lot of people will chose one or the other and rarely if ever touch the other format. Pokemon at least gives some promo codes to player who open packs to allow them to get some value online.
TL:DR - MtG has more competition than ever, poor digital presence and is expensive.
Modern decks are definitely going to be more than 1000 USD for tier 1 by the end of the year if a lot of cards don't get reprinted. I was at the point of saying someone could piecemeal their way in, but I'm skeptical of that if prices start ballooning.
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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!
Modern decks are definitely going to be more than 1000 USD for tier 1 by the end of the year if a lot of cards don't get reprinted. I was at the point of saying someone could piecemeal their way in, but I'm skeptical of that if prices start ballooning.
Hell yeah they will be. If Jund continues to rise (then again, look at the last SCG....) its very possible. BGx is 2K, right off the top, and even UW is approaching 1000.
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UW Spirits
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Spirits
Yeah, they are alluding to returning to Ravnica again since Bolas is aiming for the place and they just mind wiped vraska into being a sleeper agent or something and had her walk back through the portal to the place. At this point Dominaria is a dismal backwater plane and Ravnica is what Dominaria probably could have become if it didn't get blown apart by all the conflicts.
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!
This company is so off the rails that I doubt they even comprehend the damage they are inflicting on the game with how they are distributing and reprinting cards. This is going beyond anything the games industry in general is doing with loot boxes: This is outright ignoring the world they created and failing to support the very dream they are trying to usher in. You have singles vendors literally fighting tooth and nail with players and speculators to the point that both parties have to become speculators just to stay alive, LGS are being crushed by online box sales that go for as much as 25-30% below retail all year around, and this has become the norm at this point. Buy a Box promo cards have been underwhelming and they never have enough of them, on top of which the way those are distributed allows vendors to withhold and sell them later separately since they don't have to break open the boxes to get them. Set design has been horrific for the last couple of sets with very few redeeming qualities, and the best set they've released to date has been a freaking Un-set.
Lack of good foils, full art non-land cards, poor quality card printings, excessive msrp on booster boxes, and being overly greedy and hurting everyone except for tournament grinders has been the story of MtG since I got back to playing for the last 3 years. This is just completely insane. People should not be feeling like price is a barrier to building the deck they want to make, yet here we are, fully grown adults with jobs, and we are legitimately complaining about the prices on cards in the game. Why this game has not imploded in on itself is a mystery to me.
I'm going to say this right now: by all means, this game should legitimately be dead right now. There is no way that the average TCG could survive the kind of bad decision making this company has made over such an extended period of time. The only reason MtG is alive right now, is by the sheer tenacity of the players wanting the game to stay alive and the company has gone to abusing this relationship and cashing in off the people who love the game. By extension, this same selfish greed has spread to the other parts of the ecosystem such as the distribution and point of purchase. Thankfully the point of purchase end for consumers is the least problematic.
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 just pricing though is it? I can afford to play Standard- I am at the point of storing Mtg in safes rather than trade files- and I don't even own power 9, but I do own 20 Legacy decks, I can afford to play Standard. I just don't want to, because everything I ever enjoyed about the game has been removed from it. I will happily loan out dual lands and Tabernacles, I would not loan out a single common to a player wishing to enter a Standard event. I hate the format and want it to die in its current iteration, along with the current design paradigms.
The only standard I truly enjoyed was probably Eldrich moon because of the spirits deck basically being a version of fairies. This standard has turned into just aggro decks, decks that want to rely on energy work arounds to fix mana, and control decks running on hail mary style play. I literally haven't played standard in paper for ages and have mostly just been brewing and trying to figure out what kind of strategies are viable each push. I've gotten some games in via freebie services, but that's about it outside of some limited games, which I mostly just play to appease some friends.
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!
Because lots of other people (like me, or drmarkb) are not complaining about price.
Spirits
The reality is that you are not lots of people and neither are your friends. For the vast majority of players they are being force into making a choice of getting a playable deck or a single card and those single cards in question are being actively pushed and advertised by a 1-5% competitive group meta. It's the same situation that happens in MMOs with the raiding community and it's why there's a gulf of nightmares on youtube along with near constant drama on reddit, as well as aggravating problems that already exist within the MTG Finance community and everyone else.
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 want a Tesla Roadster, its not fair that its a $300,000 car."
Thats not legitimate, as I can instead just use the car I have, or buy a more affordable car.
Spirits
It's more about who are you targeting with that price, and the answer is that the prices on the top end of Modern are too high for normal players. The reason the prices got to the way they are is due to the limited number of cards available and the fact that sponsored teams and grinders tend to have higher amounts of available money allocated to pay for the cards. So the pricing on the cards reflect the price that a small percentage of people are willing to pay rather than the actual value of the card to most people playing at fnm level. Case in point, Liliana of the Veil would be expensive no matter how much she got printed, but she definitely wouldn't be 100 usd if she were printed enough that players could actually get their copies. The only thing keeping more recent cards from going to such levels is the larger printing runs and lower card attrition due to time.
The damage this company has done to the game is just unbelievable. It's just from so many places such as the massive over saturation of the market place with bulk cards, over priced secondary products, standard being a disaster for multiple years. This entire philosophy of focusing on draft and limited design just does not work in this game at all. No one is pushing draft and sealed heavily at major tournaments. People watch constructed magic because that is where the most deck building freedom is present. I'm just hoping Richard can somehow salvage this game with Dominaria, but it sounds like he may be in a consulting position so who knows.
Also Masters 25 is now down to 174 a box preorder. I should have just waited at this point and saved 40 dollars.
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!
Spirits
https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/7whfra/long_post_regarding_card_stock_issues_diminished/
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
That's not actually true. Modern is a framework of legality that translates beyond tournament play to many play groups that are not necessarily into playing beyond FNM. These kinds of frameworks serve a couple of purposes, but above all else it assures that players are playing with cards that hypothetically are available readily among an unknown playgroup. Tournament play is a completely different beast from a format and is the TCG equivalent of end game raiding. It's highly competitive, typically has high stakes, and also due to the competitive nature starts to define a set of tools that are required in order to play and have the best chance of winning. In this case, the tools of the trade are cards, and the correct tools have to be analyzed and sifted out of the larger pool of cards available to play the game. Once these cards are identified, this is what gives those specific cards like Chalice of the Void and others their value. So when players are paying the price for one of these tools, they are actually paying a price based on the card being a tool in high level tournament play and are paying in access of the actual card worth for general play. In addition, because of the tournament play coverage it makes these cards appear far more desirable to players abroad, which is why you end up with someone having 40 lilianas and absolutely none to trade. The cards are just too universally desired to trade off, so they stay in peoples collections unless the meta shifts and those cards fall out of favor, whether from bannings or new cards entering the format.
This wouldn't be a problem if wizards reprinted the "tool" cards in order to allow players a way to obtain them fairly, such as through standard. The problem is that the way they are printing the cards is placing these as chase cards in over priced masters sets and never knock the value back down to earth.
And before we get into this further this entire system is being caused by a much deeper problem routed in our own society that is a problem an entire generation of people are going to have to deal with, namely my own generation and probably the one following in my footsteps.
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!
Its a complete non-starter of an issue.
I have put together RG budget decks that will kill you on Turn 3 Gold fish, and the most expensive card was Copperline Gorge because I had them sitting around.
If you are talking about casual players, then why are you conflating that with tournament level prices?
Spirits
I don't know Idsurge, why don't you go ask the lovely people at wizards that social engineered the requirements. Anyway, back to the Byakko grind.
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!
Wizards isnt the one building Modern decks, they do that enough with their rail roaded, paint by numbers, Standard format.
Spirits
Actually, now that I think about it, the Roadster was mostly a proof of concept thing, as it was replaced with the much cheaper Model S.
There is intentional social engineering, and then there is "oh, people do that already so lets just take advantage of it and promote it" kind of engineering. The situation with modern tournaments and the effect it has on the general consumers playing modern is one of those latter types. They didn't actually start it, but once they realized it was there, well, that is how you got 240 msrp masters sets while people like yourself are happily paying the exorbitant prices on singles.
It also falls into that same category as knowing there are thousands of Hydroblast, yet listing them up for 2 dollars a pop 4 at a time and pretending they are limited supply. Everyone knows ice age commons are like a dime a dozen, yet now some guy who bought bulk collections of ice age can sell a single card they got probably a 1000 copies of for 2 dollars a piece?
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!
All you are really complaining about here, is Capitalism. (Note, as Canadian I am by near default a filthy Socialist..so run with that how you will.)
Spirits
Call it whatever you want. At the end of the day I"m tired of excuses like "people don't need goyfs at the kitchen table" because that is complete bollocks and you basically know it. That same phrase could be used with any single card regardless of cost and on top of which, you also don't need to play magic, but the point of the entire thing is people want to play magic and want to be able to access and build decks. Cards that are priced high simply because of a vendor based need to capitalize on grinders and sponsored teams is a problem. It's been a problem for a long time, and you laughing it off is not going to change that. Wizards should have been printing these cards through core sets or other means, but they instead axed core sets, pulled all value out of secondary products to fuel masters sets, and then over priced most of their secondary product line going to big box retail stores. s
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 mean honestly what do you want? $10 Goyfs? $15 Lilly?
You say its a problem, I say it isnt, and the game (Modern) continues to thrive...
EDIT: In fact, simply proxy it, it makes NO difference if you attribute no value to the cards, and you simply want to play those decks outside of a tournament.
GP Toronto had well over 1000 players (I think I heard 1600?) so...yeah Moderns fine.
Spirits
No my problem IdSurge is that you seem to think that I'm vouching for 10 dollar goyf and Lily, which is never going to happen realistically. What I'm saying is if they printed these cards to better meet demand they probably would be more around 35-50 usd, which is where the price should cap out.
Unfortunately, there's basically no way to undo the damage done on cards that legitimately should be around 10 dollars outside of a standard reprint, such as the mana-base. WoTC won't ever do that because the price of standard on pre-order would be too high for standard players just due to the mana alone, and by the time the price would crash down on cards like Scalding Tarn, they'd have an even bigger train wreck with standard than they already have right now. That's why a lot of people (myself included) think standard is a horrible plan if they are just supporting draft / limited.
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!
Its the 50 dollar-80 dollar Tarns that really, really annoy players though, there is no excuse for them.
As I see it, MTG has two big problems that they need to address. Ultimately, what people play will come down to what their friends play and how they can play games in their free time. Tournaments and other big name events help with the promotion, but the game lives and dies on how the casual player can engage in the game, spending money when they want.
Problem #1, Magic is expensive and with how easy it is to net deck, even casual formats cost a boat load of money, especially as formats rotate. This means that as people become more competitive, they have to either shell out the cash or eventually get off the train because they get tired of loosing to whomever in their play group has the most cash. Standard costs $350 per deck and must be updated 4 times a year, so we'll be generous say standard costs $700 per year per deck assuming card sell back and some overlap in cards. Modern is about $1000, Legacy $2000. By comparison Pokemon is about $250 per deck and if you look at LCGs, Netrunner is $100 for a deck, but you can buy the whole card pool for $400 to $500. If we look at playing ONE draft per week and all the pre-release events for most of the year, that is $870 per year.
Problem #2, Magic's digital presence is terrible. MTGO's interface is terrible and it's UI is beyond dated. In addition, if someone chooses to play online as well as in paper, they are effectively paying twice for the same game AND the online game is cheaper in some aspects, but MTGO standard and modern decks cost only about $100 less than their paper equivalents. Instead of promoting playing the game more, having split formats between MTGO and paper means a lot of people will chose one or the other and rarely if ever touch the other format. Pokemon at least gives some promo codes to player who open packs to allow them to get some value online.
TL:DR - MtG has more competition than ever, poor digital presence and is expensive.
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!
Hell yeah they will be. If Jund continues to rise (then again, look at the last SCG....) its very possible. BGx is 2K, right off the top, and even UW is approaching 1000.
Spirits