MTG Salvation

See that's where you're wrong. The EDH Community and Playgroups NEED the LGS in order to survive

Eh? Not really. Never been the case with me or my playgroup. Remember that -how Mark Rosewater always stess out- the most high number of magic players in the world are the casual kitchen table one, which means people that doesn't even know what's an LGS. And since Commander is also the most played format in Magic worldwide currently means also that many casual kitchen table playgroups all around the world, exactly like me and my friends never needed in 10+ years of Commander play, the existence of a LGS, if not maybe only to buy a precon EDH deck. Anyway nowadays we proxy everything, so we don't even need it for that reason. Oh and of course, free online programs like Cockatrice are another big deal of why not only we don't need the LGS but not even a physical space at all in order to play together if necessary. You must realize that Commander is a totally different beast than tournaments formats like standard or modern and doesn't have the same restrictions or limitations these formats have but follow his own rules. As I said WotC could go bankrupt today and I and my friends would still play Commander for the rest of our lifes.

Quote from Evil Never Dies »

See that's where you're wrong. The EDH Community and Playgroups NEED the LGS in order to survive

Eh? Not really. Never been the case with me or my playgroup. Remember that -how Mark Rosewater always stess out- the most high number of magic players in the world are the casual kitchen table one, which means people that doesn't even know what's an LGS. And since Commander is also the most played format in Magic worldwide currently means also that many casual kitchen table playgroups all around the world, exactly like me and my friends never needed in 10+ years of Commander play, the existence of a LGS, if not maybe only to buy a precon EDH deck. Anyway nowadays we proxy everything, so we don't even need it for that reason. Oh and of course, free online programs like Cockatrice are another big deal of why not only we don't need the LGS but not even a physical space at all in order to play together if necessary. You must realize that Commander is a totally different beast than tournaments formats like standard or modern and doesn't have the same restrictions or limitations these formats have but follow his own rules. As I said WotC could go bankrupt today and I and my friends would still play Commander for the rest of our lifes.

The reason why the Local Game Store (LGS) is so important is because you're keeping a local business around, supporting a place for the community to meet up and game, and still getting the goods you want. Normally that's easily worth the additional money as you're literally investing in your own community by doing this which is something that doesn't happen when you buy through online retailers where there's a two week waiting period. The value of an LGS doesn't come from it being a "local merchant," the value is in having a hub for you and those like you to share a common interest, preferably facilitated by someone who also has a vested interest in the hobby. That's worth paying an extra 10-25% for me. The problem is that LGSs aren't really able to compete with Big Box Retailers and online retailers like Amazon. The whole deal with economy of scale is that those who can handle more volume and the volatility of it, can lower their daily price. So to expect your LGS to compete against Big Box Retailers like Walmart and Target is just wishful thinking despite not offering a public service for people to play in-person. The strength of an LGS comes from contributing to the local community in some way. Classes, meet ups, anything that furthers the niche. So If I was voting with my wallet eBay wins but If purchasing a product comes with meetups and local chat groups then that's where an LGS can best out the Big Box Retailers.

Amazon undercuts prices because they can afford to make up the difference somewhere else. They don’t need to maintain shops and all those costs, they can make money in sellers’ fees, etc. LGSs don’t necessarily have those options. But the LGS gives actual people the ability to ask questions about stuff to staff employees. They provide a gaming space for the community. They’re providing jobs to people. Amazon wants to destroy the LGS and they don't care If their products sold through them are legit or not as long as they're making money. An LGS has to run a relationship selling model which can be hit or miss based on geography and how good you are at real estate and paying rent. So to the actual question as to whether If your LGS is adding value to your transaction then you have to do your own "consumer math" and figure out what it's worth to you in actual dollars. Do you play games there? Do they host events you enjoy? Do they support / foster a community you consider yourself a part of? Do they offer expert assistance in your hobby? Do they make the process of buying a game from start to finish better? If they do, and you want them to stay open, you gotta pay for it. Nothing is free. Good help costs money. A clean store costs money. Tables, chairs, demo games, prizes....they all cost money. If you want that to continue than you must pay for it. They will go away if you don't pay.

Tables, chairs, demo games, prizes....they all cost money. If you want that to continue than you must pay for it.

Excuse me, are you a bot or something? You gave me a pre-constructed answer that is a non-sequitur and totally unrelated of what I just said to you. Of course I don't give a single f*k of table, chairs or prizes or a place to play. Me and my friends already have places to play, either online (making for example telegram or facebook magic groups and play on cockatrice) or in real life meeting in each other houses. Most of Commanders and kitchen table players as I said don't give a literal f*k to LGS and I already told you that many don't even know what an LGS is and still play happily as ever. We, casual players care only about the social aspect of Magic with small circle of friends and unlike the prizes and tournaments sanctioned by WotC in competitive formats, that's something where LGS are easily out of the equation.

Now repeat with me : "WotC could even go bankrupt today and me and my friends would still play Commander for the rest of our lifes." and write it in the whiteboard 100 times like Bart of the Simpsons, until you finally grasp this very little and simple concept in your brain, ok?

Quote from Evil Never Dies »

Tables, chairs, demo games, prizes....they all cost money. If you want that to continue than you must pay for it.

Now repeat with me : "WotC could even go bankrupt today and me and my friends would still play Commander for the rest of our lifes." and write it in the whiteboard 100 times like Bart of the Simpsons, until you finally grasp this very little and simple concept in your brain, ok?

True, but...the day WoTC hits the floor it will be quite comfortable for the first few years to get get hands on cards, but from there on it will get progressively more difficult and consequentially more expensive to get cards on the 2nd hand market since it will dry up. Even for the low tier cards I reckon. At the end of the day, the LGS is a good spot to get the social aspect going I reckon even though we play mostly in the same pod at our homes for years.

True, but...the day WoTC hits the floor it will be quite comfortable for the first few years to get get hands on cards, but from there on it will get progressively more difficult and consequentially more expensive to get cards on the 2nd hand market since it will dry up.

One word. Actually, two. Print proxies. Magic Set Editor is great. And play cockatrice or any other random online service like that. If WotC will go bankrupt for real, at that point nobody in the world gonna give a **** anymore (not that many even today people cares much if you play with non-real cards in non-tournament setting), and will be a completely ethical way to make survive the game among casual players.

True, but...the day WoTC hits the floor it will be quite comfortable for the first few years to get get hands on cards, but from there on it will get progressively more difficult and consequentially more expensive to get cards on the 2nd hand market since it will dry up. Even for the low tier cards I reckon. At the end of the day, the LGS is a good spot to get the social aspect going I reckon even though we play mostly in the same pod at our homes for years.

I would venture a guess that several proxy companies would step up to fill the void of card production if the demand was there. LGS could get in on that action potentially. The WotC monopolistic stranglehold on this game I think is harming LGS. Competition and options makes for better business, in my opinion.

I don't know If anyone's already brought this up in this thread but I feel the need to address it now, the problem with Magic: The Gathering compared to Tabletop Role-Playing Games like Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and Warhammer 40k is that the Magic: The Gathering community has an unhealthy monetary relationship with their Magic: The Gathering hobby. It's basically an addiction. The Magic: The Gathering community knows what Wizards of the Coast is doing is bad but they never really punish them as a fanbase. Because of this type of relationship, fanbases aren't as united even in common sense causes like a Tabletop Role-Playing Game fanbase as big as Dungeons & Dragons.

Meanwhile, Tabletop Role-Playing Games with Dungeons & Dragons has one of many rulesets where you don't need to be tied down. They also don't need to beheld by official D&D Online tools. They can quit consuming D&D anytime and still play D&D. Unlike Magic: The Gathering there is no monetary incentive to be tied down to official ruleset and tools. You just need imagination. EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering has sort of solved this issue with proxies for casual playgroups which makes it much harder for LGSs to setup In-Person events that require every card to be proxy free which is easier said than done I'm afraid. The barrier to entry just makes it much more difficult to keep up with.

Magic is heavily monetized, people made money of it and the biggest buyers of the past where resellers themselves.

For DnD you cant really resell most of the stuff for heavy profit, lots of people pirate the books and never pay anything for the game, so its heavily under-monetized and they are aware of it.

Currently the DnD Beyond online stuff is something they make quite a bank on and they keep on monetizing it more and more. They tried with the collectable minis especially with 4th edition, but that wasnt received too well.

DnD is actually hard to monetize as people dont need any of the stuff to play the game and people already make their own campaigns and new classes, its all free online ... so spending money on DnD is a hard ask, but some people still buy all original stuff.


For Magic the collectable aspect is a huge deal. People can proxy cards and play all they want, but enough people still want to have the real cards to play in tournaments and in stores with lots more people and there is an actual culture that dislikes proxies , while some communities like cEDH actively promote proxies (but thats far smaller, people would rather build budget decks than to proxy really expensive cards).

For a lot of people Magic is just a weekly routine, a major part of their life that they cant just go away and ignore. A lot of Magic creators online are also parasitic money leeches, its not like they provide content for free, they have donations, subscriptions and what not themselves, even OnlyFans ... Magic is all about spending money, and increasingly so, in every aspect of it, there is basically no limit how much you can spend on the game.

FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is also a pretty huge deal when it comes to Magic: The Gathering. Unlike Dungeons & Dragons, If you quit consuming Magic and you come back to playing it again later after a long hiatus then you have to pay a heavy monetary price for it through market swings when new cards are released affecting how they shape the game in general. This can cause players who've been out of the game for a long period of time to have to play on a budget since the cards they once used to be able to afford are now no longer obtainable because they've been monetarily priced out of them. This is either because the cards are completely dried up within the Secondary Market from Whales (Resellers) hoarding sealed product containing reprints that would help lower the price of these cards, Wizards of the Coast / Hasbro intentionally creating artificial scarcity to increase profits for Paper Magic, or they're already being used in current existing Commander decks.

The more cards that are added onto EDH / Commander decks which rarely ever gets resold onto the Secondary Market the more it drains the supply to where Wizards of the Coast / Hasbro waits to extract the value on the supply by extracting the money through Secret Lair reprints assuming they're being sold exactly by their Secondary Market value. So unless they've found a loophole around that to sell direct-to-consumer at whatever price they want to sell them as then this is how they can avoid publicly acknowledging the Secondary Market when it comes to Magic reprints. If you stop to think about it, EDH / Commander while it's the best format in the game is also making the game more expensive and Wizards of the Coast / Hasbro isn't able to keep up with consumer demand when it comes to specific reprints. Rotation in EDH / Commander doesn't solve the issue either.