Dryad Arbor was from a cycle as well (Future shifted lands) and Urborg was from a cycle as well (An actual mega cycle, whereas the gorge was a regular cycle)
Confused Gorge with Keldon Necropolis. My fault.
There was no future shifted cycle for uncommon lands (There was for dual lands at rare. Every color got one uncommon normal frame land, Zoetic Cavern was the only other Futureshifted uncommon land.
Urborg was a call back to the land cycle from Legends. No mega cycle.
Windbrisk is just so out of place. And lackluster compared to what is already in the set and what could have been in the set. And part of a cycle where only one piece is represented.
I would have preferred it be something not from a cycle.
White - Windbrisk Heights (From a cycle)
Blue - Cephalid Coliseum (From a cycle)
Black - Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Red - Shivan Gorge (From a mega cycle)
Green - Dryad Arbor
All of these have been tournament cards (Shivan Gorge maybe a little less so). How is this out of place?
You know how sometimes people want to buy you things? Like, at certain times of the year, well-meaning relatives will express their love through the medium of gifts? It can be tricky buying a present for a Magic player if you don't know much about Magic yourself.
And that's why Wizards of the Coast is introducing the Holiday Gift Box! It's a handsome storage box that holds more than 2,000 cards. The MSRP is $19.99 and it will be available worldwide in English on November 16, 2012.
In addition to the box (and let's face it, you always need more card storage boxes), it comes with:
Four Return to Ravnica booster packs
A pack of twenty Return to Ravnica basic land
Six illustrated plastic dividers
A sticker sheet for customizing the dividers
An alternate-art Dreg Mangler from Return to Ravnica. We're not going to tell you what Dreg Mangler does.
EDIT -
- Confirmed on Twitter that the box does hold sleeved cards. Cube players rejoice.
18 premium cards
Shards block all-foil packs retailed for $14.99, and they contained 15 cards. I'll be generous and assume $20.
Whoa, wait a minute. We're assuming that this set has 10 commons, 3 uncommons, one rare/mythic and one basic land? No, we can't assume that. I doubt more than 2 of these are common, if that. There's going to be several Legendary creatures, popular ones, so that's a good number of rares and mythics right there. If anything, we'll go by the FTV, which MSRP's at $35. That gives a new number of $41.40
I think this is a marketing experiment. They've eliminated a premium product and replaced it with a super-premium product at more than double the MSRP. This is Wizards figuring out that their core demographic is now in their mid-twenties, and pricing their product accordingly, knowing that Commander players in particular are older and more willing to shell out the cash for "staples" than your average Standard player is.
In short, I smell a rat.
Or, this is a product they're offering to people who want to buy something like this. People complain when Duel Decks don't have awesome reprints, especially for $20. And now here's a product that has awesome reprints and people are saying that it's too high. Not every product is made with you in mind. There are other people who like different things. This is NOT made for Standard players. This is NOT made for budget players. For every person that wants a third "Un" set, there's a person who wants this instead.
When I went to go buy the Lord of the Rings Trilogy Extended Edition on Blu-Ray, I knew that I could get the Theatrical Cut on DVD for way cheaper. It tells the same story and it gets the job done. However, I wanted the behind the scenes extras, the longer cut, and the high quality video and audio for my viewing experience. My dad could care less about all of that, he just wants to watch the movie. Which one of us is wrong?
The only way I'd buy this product is if it had Wasteland, FOW, or a culmination of cards i need that would make up for that steep price tag by being more expensive themselves. Otherwise, I might write a letter to wotc explaining my distaste for their preferred treatment of collectors and see if they might cater to the, you know, 99% of EDH players,
Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize that you had to include foils in order to build and play an EDH deck. Well then, why doesn't WotC make every card foil in order to help out the 99% of EDH players?
Read my original post, I am talking about SITES jacking up the prices, not stores.
Infact, most brick and mortar stores sell the FTV stuff far cheaper than online I have found...I just happen to live on a island with no store that supports magic to that level.
Let me get this straight: because a BaM (Brick and Mortar) store gets a set amount (I believe the max is 15), they're selling the FtV for less if you come into the store and buy it versus selling it more online to people who don't come into the store, they're the bad people? You know, getting people coming into stores to help build a community, get people to play in FNMs, and finding a local place to play and build longer term customers instead of offering it to people who will buy it at the lowest price they can find.
Sure, the BaM could sell all of them online to make a quick profit, but is that Internet person going to come into the store, bring their friends, and draft/buy packs/FNM on a regular basis like a local customer would? Short term gain vs long term gain: which side are you on if you're the BaM?
Well, any chance of me getting this for its retail price has gone out the window...its already jacked up over £20 more than its RRP on most sites...This is why I hate card vendors and wished wizards would distribute product like this on a preorder basis to actual players.
Why? This is a collector's item. You don't make something collectible while making it available to everyone.
No, this is nothing new. If it was a new way to promote cards, then here are the issues:
1 - This is the only card we have seen of this "new way." With all of the packs that have been opened in M13, don't you think that we would've seen this more? With evidence of the "Hidden Treasures" promotion from Zendikar, there would have been more of this going on. There have been no reports besides this. That's a pretty horrible hit rate then.
2 - If this was the only one then, then what are the chances that that person would put it online? There are more casual players who don't go online to talk about cards. If they recieved this card in their pack, would their first action be putting it online? What if the card was used during a draft? What about if someone was cracking packs, taking only the rares/uncommons, and tossing the commons? You're going to base this promotion entirely on one card?
Not everything WotC does is a conspiracy. While I have my doubts on the story (though plausible), I have a diminishing belief that the card is fake.
Most of the land search/ramp - Farseek, that new Explosive Vegetation, Gem of Becoming, Liliana's cards - in M13 reference basic land types rather than just lands, too.
No Non-rare legends just before Kamigawa
No common artifacts just before Mirrodin
No legends in core set just before 8th
And a lot of other things. He says things months before he proves otherwise. I'm amazed people haven't caught on.
There's a difference between design breaking its own rules and creative trying to build a mythos. If you take a look at how much retcon Magic had to do with Ice Age/Homelands/etc in the beginning, you'd understand why they're sticking to their guns about something like this.
Confused Gorge with Keldon Necropolis. My fault.
There was no future shifted cycle for uncommon lands (There was for dual lands at rare. Every color got one uncommon normal frame land, Zoetic Cavern was the only other Futureshifted uncommon land.
Urborg was a call back to the land cycle from Legends. No mega cycle.
White - Windbrisk Heights (From a cycle)
Blue - Cephalid Coliseum (From a cycle)
Black - Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Red - Shivan Gorge (From a mega cycle)
Green - Dryad Arbor
All of these have been tournament cards (Shivan Gorge maybe a little less so). How is this out of place?
Oh no! You have a ton of other good lands and every color is represented. Let's all cry that Wasteland isn't in here. No other money cards. Boo hoo.
I added it to the first post.
EDIT -
- Confirmed on Twitter that the box does hold sleeved cards. Cube players rejoice.
- Made from "Sturdy Cardboard"
Let's see if I can.
One Dollar! Oh, wait...
Looks good to me.
Whoa, wait a minute. We're assuming that this set has 10 commons, 3 uncommons, one rare/mythic and one basic land? No, we can't assume that. I doubt more than 2 of these are common, if that. There's going to be several Legendary creatures, popular ones, so that's a good number of rares and mythics right there. If anything, we'll go by the FTV, which MSRP's at $35. That gives a new number of $41.40
Uh, way off on that. Spindown dice go for $1-2. Bases for spinning life counters go for about $8-10. Faceplates are another $8-10. So $16-20 for this, we'll say $15, just to be on the safe side.
Non-Commander Release Promo foil oversized Commanders (non-Planar Chaos Dragons) are $2 a piece. $20 of them here.
50 regular bead counters: $5. We'll be safe and call this $5 as well, even though I believe they're worth more.
By my account, it's $99.40. And that's without knowing what other cards are in here.
Or, this is a product they're offering to people who want to buy something like this. People complain when Duel Decks don't have awesome reprints, especially for $20. And now here's a product that has awesome reprints and people are saying that it's too high. Not every product is made with you in mind. There are other people who like different things. This is NOT made for Standard players. This is NOT made for budget players. For every person that wants a third "Un" set, there's a person who wants this instead.
Neither.
We both like our style just fine.
Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize that you had to include foils in order to build and play an EDH deck. Well then, why doesn't WotC make every card foil in order to help out the 99% of EDH players?
Let me get this straight: because a BaM (Brick and Mortar) store gets a set amount (I believe the max is 15), they're selling the FtV for less if you come into the store and buy it versus selling it more online to people who don't come into the store, they're the bad people? You know, getting people coming into stores to help build a community, get people to play in FNMs, and finding a local place to play and build longer term customers instead of offering it to people who will buy it at the lowest price they can find.
Sure, the BaM could sell all of them online to make a quick profit, but is that Internet person going to come into the store, bring their friends, and draft/buy packs/FNM on a regular basis like a local customer would? Short term gain vs long term gain: which side are you on if you're the BaM?
Why? This is a collector's item. You don't make something collectible while making it available to everyone.
No, this is nothing new. If it was a new way to promote cards, then here are the issues:
1 - This is the only card we have seen of this "new way." With all of the packs that have been opened in M13, don't you think that we would've seen this more? With evidence of the "Hidden Treasures" promotion from Zendikar, there would have been more of this going on. There have been no reports besides this. That's a pretty horrible hit rate then.
2 - If this was the only one then, then what are the chances that that person would put it online? There are more casual players who don't go online to talk about cards. If they recieved this card in their pack, would their first action be putting it online? What if the card was used during a draft? What about if someone was cracking packs, taking only the rares/uncommons, and tossing the commons? You're going to base this promotion entirely on one card?
Not everything WotC does is a conspiracy. While I have my doubts on the story (though plausible), I have a diminishing belief that the card is fake.
I broke down some of the data here in my blog.
There's a difference between design breaking its own rules and creative trying to build a mythos. If you take a look at how much retcon Magic had to do with Ice Age/Homelands/etc in the beginning, you'd understand why they're sticking to their guns about something like this.