I feel like you are probably jumping ahead of yourself if you want to go from just starting out to a Tier 1 deck. Buy a Planeswalker deck and learn to play the game. Once you have mastered the fundamentals, you can think about how to expand.
A few ideas on how to expand:
- Buy the Deck Builder's Toolkit. This will give you many cards to play with but very few play sets, which is a bummer.
- Buy packs. This is a fun way to get new cards but it is expensive and rarely gives you play sets (unless you buy a lot of packs).
- Draft. This is the best way to use packs and hone your skills at becoming a better player.
- Go to eBay. They have auctions for play sets (4 of each card) of all the commons and uncommons from a particular set. This is an efficient way to get play sets of cards and expand your collection.
By the time you really become ready to worry about tier 1 decks, Ixilan (the next set) will be out and with it, a lot of older sets will rotate out of standard, thus shaking standard up.
Standard should be cheap, it is a throw-a-way format whose whole point is to constantly change and evolve. 400-500 bucks is RIDICULOUS for a deck that will only be legal for a max of two years (usually less, sometimes a lot less).
I believe that Mark Rosewater said on his tumblr that when Return to Ravnica was released, they were just about done with Dragon's Maze. Frustratingly, I can't find that post again, but if my memory is correct it would indicate that they have about a two-set delay in responding to any problems.
Of course, remember that's in the very late stages of set development, and last-minute changes can easily backfire (many problematic cards got that way because of a last-minute change that as a result wasn't properly playtested--for example, Jace the Mind Sculptor got a huge boost in power when his +2 changed from milling two cards to its current fateseal ability), so you want to be careful about how you do those.
I have no doubt that WotC will be forced to develop a new eternal format. It will grow increasingly difficult for people to find cards for non-outrageous sums of money in Modern as we continue on into the future. It is in WotC's best interest to eventually cull the back catalog and create a new Eternal format. Modern-lite, for sure, but it is what it is. Hopefully this new eternal format will be better curated and managed than Modern has been. Let's be honest, it should be better managed since no matter where they arbitrarily place the dividing line, all the sets will all be from the New World Order.
The tokens are artificially rare since that slot usually contains a land, a token or an ad. So at a minimum, a 1/3 of all packs have tokens.
Amonkhet had 25 tokens and they are contained in a 1/3rd of all packs (at a minimum): (1/3) x (1/25) = 0.013 or a 1.3% chance of pulling the one you want.
Mythic Rares are 1 in 8 packs and there are 17 Mythic Rares. (1/8) x (1/17) = .007 or .7% chance of pulling a specific Mythic Rare.
Amonkhet has 65 rares and you get 7 out of every 8 packs. (7/8) x (1/65) = .013 or a 1.3% chance of pulling a specific Rare card.
So for Amonkhet (which has an above average number of tokens), you are about as likely to pull a specific token as you are to pull a specific rare.
The nice thing about the Bundles for Hour of Devastation was that they included a stack of double sided Tokens, which was a pleasant surprise (for me).
You would think they would hand the double sided tokens out like candy, while keeping promos for placing at the tourneys.
I know I want the tokens but I am not going to win or place at FNM often enough to justify the expenditure of making a bleeding edge standard deck. Especially not when I could just go to eBay and buy the tokens.
I suppose I could do that if the tokens were handed out like candy but... I feel like I would not mind playing and losing with my rogue decks if I was getting something I wanted.
A lot of these changes reek of people desperately trying to come up with a reason why the business is not working the way it should be and then coming up with hair brain solutions to try to fix the problems so they can keep their jobs.
I imagine the threat of Hasbro coming in and culling the herd is an ever present threat. The D&D side of the business was gutted over the last few years.
At the end of the day, management is to blame and they will (eventually) be the ones to pay the price. Most of the higher ups in Magic have been there for decades. Maybe it is time for new blood to rise up.
i like the commander. it effectively grants a creatures +6/+6 plus whatever its original power was. That is potent.
One dimensional Sure.
But still a lot of fun. Especially when combined with pump cards.
So you could effectively have Leonin Skyhunter out on the field. Pump him with Titanic Growth. He is then pumped by the Commander and you pay for the Commander's extra cost. You have thus created a 18/18 flying trample creature (2+4=6+3=9+9=18). That is suuuuper easy to pull off too.
Saw a Magic: The Gathering Mystery Box at Wal*Mart. The store was really light on Magic Cards (only a few packs of Amonhet left), so I figured, why not? I picked it up and found that someone had already popped the box open, stolen the packs and stuffed two Twix wrappers into the box.
Turn 2 it is very strong. It is a risky gamble, for sure but the pay off is potentially great. Late game he becomes even better because you will typically have fewer cards to cast per turn and lots of mana to spare.
A few ideas on how to expand:
- Buy the Deck Builder's Toolkit. This will give you many cards to play with but very few play sets, which is a bummer.
- Buy packs. This is a fun way to get new cards but it is expensive and rarely gives you play sets (unless you buy a lot of packs).
- Draft. This is the best way to use packs and hone your skills at becoming a better player.
- Go to eBay. They have auctions for play sets (4 of each card) of all the commons and uncommons from a particular set. This is an efficient way to get play sets of cards and expand your collection.
By the time you really become ready to worry about tier 1 decks, Ixilan (the next set) will be out and with it, a lot of older sets will rotate out of standard, thus shaking standard up.
"Sets tend to be in the Future Future League for about six months total. Much like how we release four sets a year, we also have similar FFL periods relating to those sets. The idea is that whenever a set is released, we are finalizing the next year's set in the same time frame. For instance, when Khans of Tarkir came out, we were looking at the real-world results of the first few weeks of Standard and the Pro Tour to see if there was anything major that we missed as we were finalizing Battle for Zendikar."
For Counterspell, it is only legal in:
Amonkhet had 25 tokens and they are contained in a 1/3rd of all packs (at a minimum): (1/3) x (1/25) = 0.013 or a 1.3% chance of pulling the one you want.
Mythic Rares are 1 in 8 packs and there are 17 Mythic Rares. (1/8) x (1/17) = .007 or .7% chance of pulling a specific Mythic Rare.
Amonkhet has 65 rares and you get 7 out of every 8 packs. (7/8) x (1/65) = .013 or a 1.3% chance of pulling a specific Rare card.
So for Amonkhet (which has an above average number of tokens), you are about as likely to pull a specific token as you are to pull a specific rare.
The nice thing about the Bundles for Hour of Devastation was that they included a stack of double sided Tokens, which was a pleasant surprise (for me).
I know I want the tokens but I am not going to win or place at FNM often enough to justify the expenditure of making a bleeding edge standard deck. Especially not when I could just go to eBay and buy the tokens.
I suppose I could do that if the tokens were handed out like candy but... I feel like I would not mind playing and losing with my rogue decks if I was getting something I wanted.
I imagine the threat of Hasbro coming in and culling the herd is an ever present threat. The D&D side of the business was gutted over the last few years.
At the end of the day, management is to blame and they will (eventually) be the ones to pay the price. Most of the higher ups in Magic have been there for decades. Maybe it is time for new blood to rise up.
One dimensional Sure.
But still a lot of fun. Especially when combined with pump cards.
So you could effectively have Leonin Skyhunter out on the field. Pump him with Titanic Growth. He is then pumped by the Commander and you pay for the Commander's extra cost. You have thus created a 18/18 flying trample creature (2+4=6+3=9+9=18). That is suuuuper easy to pull off too.
To think I balked at the idea of paying 20 bucks a pop for Dark Confidants back when Ravnica came out. #BadLifeChoices
Turn 2 it is very strong. It is a risky gamble, for sure but the pay off is potentially great. Late game he becomes even better because you will typically have fewer cards to cast per turn and lots of mana to spare.
Pretty much. They want to move passed the last rocky year and look towards a bright future.