If this were a core set, it would be a great one. Who wouldn't wan't to play this set at 4$ a pack? At 6$ a pack, I'd be super down: there are quite a few chase rares and some sweet uncommons. Plus, the watermarks look nice, and I'm sure the set is really fun and nostalgic to draft. At 10$ a pack, the set is a joke and a mistake. Let it pass by.
Yeah, if someone got boxes at 155 USD or 160 a box, I'd say don't cancel the preorder. If someone is paying 190 or higher just cancel. This set is not worth the price and people have a lot of these cards rotting in bulk bins.
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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!
I think at this point, WotC's sales numbers for Magic sets primarily comes from big MTG retailers like SCG, Card Kingdom, Channel Fireball, etc. Those companies can buy a lot of Magic sets, open the packs, and sell the singles. Players don't buy as many sets or boosters themselves and then they go buy the singles. To Wizards, their sales numbers look fine, because the product is getting sold. If players decrease buying boosters or boxes, but they still buy singles from those sets, Wizards still wins. Demand has to drop significantly to affect these retailers, which in turn affects Wizards, for Wizards to re-think their strategy.
I wanted to highlight this because this is the gosh honest truth. Wizards makes their money on these selling to the Big Boys and the distributors. We as the end buyer do have some say in the matter though. If we refrain from buying any booster boxes, it forces those distributors to rethink how much and at what price they buy from WotC. We need to hold firm and don't overpay for this product or purchase it at all. Then we have to show some restraint on singles purchases as well or put it off to a future date when prices relax again forcing the middlemen to rethink their strategy.
Discipline in buying and do not overpay. Its about all we can do. And yes calling out Hasbro/Wizards BS card picks for these "Masters" sets. If we don't they are going to continue laughing all the way to the bank.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
I liked Chronicles, a ton of other people did as well. Ernam, Blood Moon, Enchant Worlds like Land's Edge, all those cool legendary guys, Storm Seeker, Urza's lands
those cards were all played in Standard; and no one cared about secondary markets and collections because there was a Tsunami of Standard playing going on
and it was the heart and Lifeblood of the company.
expensive packs don't serve the supposed goal of increasing accessibility, look at all the cards reprinted in the first modern masters set and how well that set up the public for building their collections. high pack price means less bought, increased rarity, secondary market + collectors etc etc etc
They've tried 'reprinting to death' Tarmagoyf and it's failed. (insert made up %)people still don't have a playset of them
people can't even get a set of Scarab Gods unless they bought at set release, and that was a year ago... how about your Phoenixes!?!? didn't think so.
I think if there was no mythic rarity the game would exist today as it did for more than a decade where anyone could make a competitive deck and if they found a deck someone else had made they liked they could put it together without too much difficulty and needn't sweat hundreds of dollars on trying out something new.
now someone can continue this rant regarding the placement of format warping cards at mythic rarity, hoohoo where have we seen that before..
Well as I said in the other thread the only thing keeping the set from tanking during this pre-order season is the hype train, moralistic factors with canceling pre-orders, and the typical "limited supply so come get it while it is there" tactic being pulled by the secondary market. This is just a mess and no one should be buying this set at all. The pack EV on launch day is already below the cost of a pack by a significant margin. I think the numbers I've seen indicate around 7 dollars a pack. Might I add that is the EV before release! The EV is going to be the stuff of nightmares once it does get released unless no one is opening boxes. A lot of good that will do. Also even if the prices look good on TCG Player, be sure to look at "other versions". The prices are already falling.
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 personally think Wizards should simply stop doing ''masters'' sets every year. Doing it every year does make things lose their value but most importantly, it makes the cards loose their ''special'' feel. Just look at planeswalkers now and then. We get so many planeswalkers per set now that they have become just another card type.
If they did a masters set every 3 years or so, would allow them to put more value into each set since the reprints would happen less often. Wizards would make money, we would be happy to see awesome sets, win win situation. Original Modern Masters was great for that reason.
Overall i don't think the problem is the set itself but rather the fact these types of sets don't feel special to us players anymore.
Wizards/Hasbro higher-ups upon seeing topics like this:
Wizards / Hasbro seeing a topic like this likely is going to result in them going into a panic. This isn't even something they can brush off anymore because once you start hitting people like this consecutively people become weary of pre-ordering, which cascades up the distribution line from the consumer all the way to the distributor. If this was during RTR or something, yeah the gif would be pretty much how this works.
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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!
Wizards/Hasbro higher-ups upon seeing topics like this:
Awesome. Someone needs to photoshop in a box of upcoming Masters 26 product in the background with "Coming in 2019" and cards like Emmara Tandris and Derelor as the face cards at Mythic.
Wizards / Hasbro seeing a topic like this likely is going to result in them going into a panic.
I find that doubtful. More than likely this scenario in the gif above and then they retire to the smoking room lighting high priced cigars with Black Lotus's sipping Brandy then off to the executive washroom where they wipe themselves with copies of foil Jace, the Mind Sculptor on rolls in the stalls, while planning on buying a new mega-yacht.
Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
I'm hoping to see more like these but I have a feeling we will start to see the opposite as WotC starts ordering their lackeys to pump up this product. Whatever the case watch or don't. Just thought I'd share.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
It seems to me that the biggest problem in terms of value isn't the overall EV, it's the lack of distribution of value throughout the set. Most of the the money is tied up in a handful of chase mythics and a few decent rares, so while the mean average value of a pack might not be too bad, the median average is going to be awful, resulting in a lot of 'feels bad' pack openings.
The other issue with value is that a few of the really expensive cards are only expensive because of scarcity. I mean how sought after is Imperial Recruiter? It only sees play in a couple of fringe Legacy decks. There's a real possibility that this set's EV tanks once product is opened because of this.
On another note, I would have loved to have seen just a few more cards that really defined their respective eras or were known as powerful cards for their time. Things like Fires of Yavimaya, Psychotog, Vampiric Tutor, Shivan Drgaon or Serendib Efreet (bonus points for giving it a green frame). Or for set with tonnes of cycling, Astral Slide. They should have avoided cards that people will open and think, 'When did THAT ever see play?'.
On the other hand, the format looks like a fun draft experience. I'm just not sure the it's worth the cost.
It seems to me that the biggest problem in terms of value isn't the overall EV, it's the lack of distribution of value throughout the set. Most of the the money is tied up in a handful of chase mythics and a few decent rares, so while the mean average value of a pack might not be too bad, the median average is going to be awful, resulting in a lot of 'feels bad' pack openings.
The other issue with value is that a few of the really expensive cards are only expensive because of scarcity. I mean how sought after is Imperial Recruiter? It only sees play in a couple of fringe Legacy decks. There's a real possibility that this set's EV tanks once product is opened because of this.
On another note, I would have loved to have seen just a few more cards that really defined their respective eras or were known as powerful cards for their time. Things like Fires of Yavimaya, Psychotog, Vampiric Tutor, Shivan Drgaon or Serendib Efreet (bonus points for giving it a green frame). Or for set with tonnes of cycling, Astral Slide. They should have avoided cards that people will open and think, 'When did THAT ever see play?'.
On the other hand, the format looks like a fun draft experience. I'm just not sure the it's worth the cost.
EV will tank without any doubt.
And no, its not worth drafting. Don't reward anyone for this junk. Draft a different set.
Finally another thing Massturds 25 is screwing up is that the price of certain Modern playables people were assuming would get a reprint are now spiking in price. Cards like Karn, Through the Breach, Collonade and others. This set is an epic fail top to bottom.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
At 200 a box this set is decent. I wouldn't pay a cent more than that. Now the problem is with a set like this, as with most masters sets is that dude to the high price tag variance hurts alot more. You WILL have people spend 200 bucks and get 30 out of boxes of 25 that said you will also have just as many people pull 300 plus out of boxes. The higher risk reward of master boxes is a big turn off for a lot of people and through the years its just compounded. This doesnt help that this ok set is right after a rather bad one. EV of a box should of been a target of around 300 if they were looking to get the bad taste of iconic out of peoples mouth and with the EV sitting at around MSRP it just doesnt cut it.
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SonofaBith - Wizards was so excited about making the packaging for Modern Masters 2 recyclable, they decided to make most of the rares and all but 1 of the UC's recycle-bin ready too. Convenient!
Wizards has, on a consistent basis, said they do not recognize the existence of the secondary market. By these I don't mean they don't think it doesn't exist, but as a company they state that for all intents and purposes, they pretend it doesn't exist. This is a way for them to pat the heads of the community and assure us that what they print in sets won't be influenced by the secondary market.
However, the existence of the Masters sets literally punches this narrative in the face. The $10 MSRP Hadoukens the narrative into a fine mist. Why are these packs $10? Is it because it is a special draft set, and that is why it is considered 'premium'? Well no, because both Conspiracy sets had a regular MSRP. So..what, is it because there are foils in every pack? I mean sure, if you want to push it that way, then selling the Masters sets at $6 MSRP seems more feasible. "Hey, there are foils in every single pack, so MSRP on boosters will be up by 50% for this set," is a logical line that most people on some level will be able to understand. Sure, it definitely costs a lot more money to print a lot more foils. No arguments there. But not 250% regular booster MSRP more.
So the only reason remaining for Masters set boosters having an MSRP of $10 is because the contents of the boosters are premium cards, worth more money on average than a standard set. Meaning that Wizards acknowledges the secondary market.
Now, I am not a lawyer, so I have no knowledge of any laws or regulations that would deal with a company attempting to make money off of the secondary market sale of their products, but this is exactly what the purpose of the Masters Sets is.
Imagine if you will, this decorative plates some people's mothers buy to hang on the living room wall (my mom has a bajillion of them). Now, all the plates are manufactured, and sold to distributors for the same price. A plate made this week, will sell to the distributors for the same price as a plate made last month. The only time the price will change is when the cost of production increases, and this makes sense. If it costs more money to make the thing, you have to charge more money to sell it. Now imagine the company that makes these plates decides that they're going to reproduce a plate with the same artwork as one they did 20 years ago. It's an old design, so they haven't sold them in years, but the secondary market value of them is high. It doesn't cost them anything extra to make the plate with this design, but because they are aware of the cost of them on the secondary market, they charge distributors a hell of a lot more for them. So let's say instead of $10/plate, they are not charging $25 per plate. They are selling the product for 250% of the value, but the production costs have not gone up at all. So in essence, they are getting $15 free profit off of each of these plates. Well, the reason these plates were expensive on the secondary market were because there weren't a lot of them. But now that there are more out there, the secondary market value goes down. Well because it's gone down, distributors aren't going to want to pay $25 for them anymore. In fact, distributors may have to sell them at a loss just so they don't have to store the stock in a warehouse. So the company that made the plates makes a huge profit, and the distributors more than likely take not a huge, but a substantial loss. Well the plate company decides to once again release an old plate. They produce as much as they did last time, since everyone bought them in droves. Only this time no one busy nearly as many of them for $25. The distributors are worried about taking a loss just like last time, so they only buy a few. This means the company now needs to store them somewhere, or lower the price they wanted to sell at. They could just go down to the standard $10 again, since like stated before, it isn't costing them extras to make these fancy old-art plates. They're just jacking up the price because of the secondary market. Eventually this cycle continues until distributors just stop buying the products all together from the company because they are too expensive, and don't actually give distributors enough of a profit to justify their purchase.
This is the Masters Sets. They started off as a way for Wizards to give players better access to older cards. Then it turned into a game of a secondary market stock exchange. They are trying to see how low they can make the value of these sets before people just all together stop buying them. They are honestly just trying to throw consumer good will out the window with the attempt to squeeze every last desperate penny out of all of our wallets. And I mean sure, Wizards is a business, they need to make money. I understand that. But there is making money, and then there is trying to take advantage of your customers. Guess which of those are the sole purpose of the Masters sets.
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Modern Decks: UBG Lantern Control GBU BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
It seems like there is too much of a focus on the EV of boxes and how that works out, if you are only going to be buying 3 or 6 packs you are most likly to get shafted. As someone who only plans to attend a draft or two this set looks to be pretty terrible in terms of value. I get the arguments that the EV for a box is in the right ballpark (for now anyway) but for those of us can't afford a box things seem much worse; I was hoping to get to a draft and trade what I opened at the end of the day for a new cube card or two but with such a high variance I could come home with nothing of value at all.
I get there is going to be variance but when the packs are priced so much higher than a regular it feels so much worse. A regular draft isn't so bad if I open junk rares, I'm only out £10 but M25 could easily cost me three times that. It sucks because it seems like a fun set to draft but I just can bring myself to spend that much when there is such a low chance of getting close to the value in cards that I spent on the draft.
With such a high variance in pacs I expect people will find themselves in the "need or greed" position; do I want the ideal card for my deck or the valuable off-color rare? With the price of entry so high I would probably have to go with the expensive card to offset the cost of the draft. I get this is a problem with every set, but again it is multiplied by the cost of the booster.
I am banking on the 2Headed Giant set to have a bunch of cards they actually design to be playable in legacy and the like.
That either ends in a nightmare period of time like with True-Name Nemesis or its just a terrible execution, but a set full or reprints is totally not a product made for me.
I just outright HATE reprints that not even give existing cards at the very least a new artwork, its the laziest kind of printing and design process that they possible can do and they should always be ASHAMED when they do that.
That reminds me..why the **** wasn't TNN in this set?
I am banking on the 2Headed Giant set to have a bunch of cards they actually design to be playable in legacy and the like.
That either ends in a nightmare period of time like with True-Name Nemesis or its just a terrible execution, but a set full or reprints is totally not a product made for me.
I just outright HATE reprints that not even give existing cards at the very least a new artwork, its the laziest kind of printing and design process that they possible can do and they should always be ASHAMED when they do that.
That reminds me..why the **** wasn't TNN in this set?
Good question, but it would have to be mythic. Even at rare it would wreck limited.
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Can you name all of the creature types with at least 20 cards? Try my Sporcle Quiz! Last Updated: 6/29/20 (Core Set 2021).
I am not sure why people are so upset about 10$ premium pack.
It helps keep it from becoming another "Chronicals".
Honestly the thing I love about these "premium sets" is the draftability. It's like playing a mini-cube.
So far - it looks like it could be an insanely fun draft format.
Because no one wants to open a $10 pack to only see a bunch of chaff. If these sets were filled to the brim with value where a player would be guaranteed to get around $10 back in secondary market value, that price tag could be justified but we know that it costs just as much to print Masters packs as it does to print standard packs. This makes these sets stink of being $10 pack lotteries designed to make players hope to pull a Chalice of the Void, Imperial Recruiter or Jace the Mind Sculptor. WOTC is trying to serve two masters and it isn't working. Are these supposed to be value reprint sets or great limited environments? We've already examined how they're not doing so hot on the former and if it's the latter then why do they expect players to drop $10 on limited packs with an experience that as mostly been met with an "eh, it's okay" instead of spending $10 on Innistrad packs, a set widely thought of to be one of thr best limited environments of all time? And if the point of these sets is to offer affordable reprints to players then why are packs over double the normal price?
None of this would be as much of a problem of the packs were normally priced but at over double the normal pack msrp a lot of players do not feel like WOTC is producing a product that matches its price tag. I honestly wonder how sales of this set would look without invetsors and card stores busting hundreds of packs to sell the expensive singles.
See my first point. If packs were cheaper, they could easily become another Chronicles which would be terrible.
The whole purpose of the price point is to prevent another Chronicals. Over-printing (at cheap prices) is just as bad as not enough value.
Explain your logic please? I'm having a hard time understanding why wotc can't print cards for $10 booster packs that have a decent chance of not turning into a $00.25 wasted lottery ticket.
Are you saying that overprinting boosters at a HIGH price point with LITTLE return on investment is better than selling boosters at an MSRP that is closer to the expected value of the cards inside?
Wizards reprinted Jace to sell m25 because they knew that the rest of the set was garbage, without a mythic Chase card they wouldn't have a chance of selling this set for his price.
Right now, this looks to me like a bunch of $10 lottery tickets. After all, each card is worth exactly 1/15 of the pack MSRP right?
The issue all sides of the community that play constructed formats agree on is that the method of distribution for cards is very off for this game. When standard became problematic players just stopped playing the game instead of falling into the modern safety net and with pauper being affordable by comparison and popular online, places like SCG adopted it as a new paper tournament format.
Basically, the secondary market gets flooded with cards that are not seeing play in the competitive meta whenever these sets get released while the competitive cards get stuck at mythic and never really reach the market except for a short period of time. This is why the game makers of pokemon take care to print these cards in collector tins, as it's impossible to get them in any other fashion without paying through the nose. I still don't understand why they don't make 50 dollar collector tins with Mox Opal, Scalding Tarn, etc as the face card, put a booster pack in, maybe a anniversary collectors pin, and call it a day.
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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!
I wholeheartedly disagree. Its a scam at that price. If I was seriously looking to buy a box at this time I wouldn't pay a dime more than 150 and even then it might be overpaying. Look at Iconic box prices and you see where this set is going. I'll pick up a box 4 to 6 months out for 120 to 140 shipped. It will happen, don't overpay for this junk.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Here's the problem with the set. The preorder prices are okay.. However, a lot of reprint equity is being pulled from cards that simply have low supply and that do not have the required demand to keep that price. Iconic was much the same way, it actually looked VERY sweet when spoiled but people realized how much those prices of those cards were being propped up by low supply.
Modern I believe is the one format that can consistently have that demand and require such action. Legacy to a smaller extent. Cards purely meant for commander (lands included) are going to drop a lot as a 1-of in a casual format is not the demand of a 4-of in a competitive format.
Their failing is not understanding this when considering secondary market value for these sets. This would be okay though if the cards were not $7 a pack. And yes, they are throwing out too many masters products to make this sustainable at this pace.
Because no one wants to open a $10 pack to only see a bunch of chaff. If these sets were filled to the brim with value where a player would be guaranteed to get around $10 back in secondary market value, that price tag could be justified
This is literally impossible. The secondary market price would just drop. You're never going to be guaranteed to get more from opening a pack than the pack's price.
but we know that it costs just as much to print Masters packs as it does to print standard packs. This makes these sets stink of being $10 pack lotteries designed to make players hope to pull a Chalice of the Void, Imperial Recruiter or Jace the Mind Sculptor.
Yes, Magic is in some ways like a mini-lottery. You don't know what you're going to get. Lots of people play the lottery. A lot more than play Magic. And they buy tickets at a lot more than $10 each. The element of chance is a known part of buying Magic boosters.
I'm not going to tell you to buy M25 if you don't want to. Hell, I wouldn't tell you to play MTG at all if you don't want to. Some of these expectations just strike me as odd.
They said around not more than. Idealy you want to pull ABOUT the value of the pack in product. Their will always be varrances but idealy, you want to spend X and get X dollars of cards. It almost never works out this way due to real world market/supply demand but ideal, each pack should have APROX value= the contents inside. Not more (then no one would ever sell packs) but as clost to retail as possable. You don't want "swingy $50 mythics" you want hoards of $3-5 rares. (in a normal set, if we assume that the commons/uncommons have neglitable value) as low risk as possable, lots of power spread around lots of cards allow the value to be soaked up evenly.
People have latched onto the box value vs box price mismatch, and I agree with pretty much all the complaints. The things that really get me though are the complete miss on creating an iconic set of cards representing magics history. Like Primal Clay and Pendlehaven not only fail as representative of theirs sets, they were first presented to most players as reprints.
I'm also tired of the "but limited design!" Argument. I don't know if it's just their go-to excuse, or if they really are that concerned with standardizing their linited play experience but... Sets were fun to draft prior to current limited design structure, and I personally feel like wizards spends too much time engineering limited archetypes rather than letting them evolve naturally. Original ravnica block was the most fun I ever had in draft, and it wouldn't make it by today's design standards.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
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 wanted to highlight this because this is the gosh honest truth. Wizards makes their money on these selling to the Big Boys and the distributors. We as the end buyer do have some say in the matter though. If we refrain from buying any booster boxes, it forces those distributors to rethink how much and at what price they buy from WotC. We need to hold firm and don't overpay for this product or purchase it at all. Then we have to show some restraint on singles purchases as well or put it off to a future date when prices relax again forcing the middlemen to rethink their strategy.
Discipline in buying and do not overpay. Its about all we can do. And yes calling out Hasbro/Wizards BS card picks for these "Masters" sets. If we don't they are going to continue laughing all the way to the bank.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Magic players: So dumb that this set is basically going to be Jace lottery for mythics.
Also Magic players: Printing Chalice and Bridge at mythic was such a missed opportunity.
those cards were all played in Standard; and no one cared about secondary markets and collections because there was a Tsunami of Standard playing going on
and it was the heart and Lifeblood of the company.
expensive packs don't serve the supposed goal of increasing accessibility, look at all the cards reprinted in the first modern masters set and how well that set up the public for building their collections. high pack price means less bought, increased rarity, secondary market + collectors etc etc etc
They've tried 'reprinting to death' Tarmagoyf and it's failed. (insert made up %)people still don't have a playset of them
people can't even get a set of Scarab Gods unless they bought at set release, and that was a year ago... how about your Phoenixes!?!? didn't think so.
I think if there was no mythic rarity the game would exist today as it did for more than a decade where anyone could make a competitive deck and if they found a deck someone else had made they liked they could put it together without too much difficulty and needn't sweat hundreds of dollars on trying out something new.
now someone can continue this rant regarding the placement of format warping cards at mythic rarity, hoohoo where have we seen that before..
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 they did a masters set every 3 years or so, would allow them to put more value into each set since the reprints would happen less often. Wizards would make money, we would be happy to see awesome sets, win win situation. Original Modern Masters was great for that reason.
Overall i don't think the problem is the set itself but rather the fact these types of sets don't feel special to us players anymore.
Wizards / Hasbro seeing a topic like this likely is going to result in them going into a panic. This isn't even something they can brush off anymore because once you start hitting people like this consecutively people become weary of pre-ordering, which cascades up the distribution line from the consumer all the way to the distributor. If this was during RTR or something, yeah the gif would be pretty much how this works.
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!
Awesome. Someone needs to photoshop in a box of upcoming Masters 26 product in the background with "Coming in 2019" and cards like Emmara Tandris and Derelor as the face cards at Mythic.
I find that doubtful. More than likely this scenario in the gif above and then they retire to the smoking room lighting high priced cigars with Black Lotus's sipping Brandy then off to the executive washroom where they wipe themselves with copies of foil Jace, the Mind Sculptor on rolls in the stalls, while planning on buying a new mega-yacht.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2k6TDw_cnc
I'm hoping to see more like these but I have a feeling we will start to see the opposite as WotC starts ordering their lackeys to pump up this product. Whatever the case watch or don't. Just thought I'd share.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
The other issue with value is that a few of the really expensive cards are only expensive because of scarcity. I mean how sought after is Imperial Recruiter? It only sees play in a couple of fringe Legacy decks. There's a real possibility that this set's EV tanks once product is opened because of this.
On another note, I would have loved to have seen just a few more cards that really defined their respective eras or were known as powerful cards for their time. Things like Fires of Yavimaya, Psychotog, Vampiric Tutor, Shivan Drgaon or Serendib Efreet (bonus points for giving it a green frame). Or for set with tonnes of cycling, Astral Slide. They should have avoided cards that people will open and think, 'When did THAT ever see play?'.
On the other hand, the format looks like a fun draft experience. I'm just not sure the it's worth the cost.
EV will tank without any doubt.
And no, its not worth drafting. Don't reward anyone for this junk. Draft a different set.
Finally another thing Massturds 25 is screwing up is that the price of certain Modern playables people were assuming would get a reprint are now spiking in price. Cards like Karn, Through the Breach, Collonade and others. This set is an epic fail top to bottom.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
GW Rhys the Redeemed EDH
RUGAnimar, Soul of Elements EDH
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death EDH
Wizards has, on a consistent basis, said they do not recognize the existence of the secondary market. By these I don't mean they don't think it doesn't exist, but as a company they state that for all intents and purposes, they pretend it doesn't exist. This is a way for them to pat the heads of the community and assure us that what they print in sets won't be influenced by the secondary market.
However, the existence of the Masters sets literally punches this narrative in the face. The $10 MSRP Hadoukens the narrative into a fine mist. Why are these packs $10? Is it because it is a special draft set, and that is why it is considered 'premium'? Well no, because both Conspiracy sets had a regular MSRP. So..what, is it because there are foils in every pack? I mean sure, if you want to push it that way, then selling the Masters sets at $6 MSRP seems more feasible. "Hey, there are foils in every single pack, so MSRP on boosters will be up by 50% for this set," is a logical line that most people on some level will be able to understand. Sure, it definitely costs a lot more money to print a lot more foils. No arguments there. But not 250% regular booster MSRP more.
So the only reason remaining for Masters set boosters having an MSRP of $10 is because the contents of the boosters are premium cards, worth more money on average than a standard set. Meaning that Wizards acknowledges the secondary market.
Now, I am not a lawyer, so I have no knowledge of any laws or regulations that would deal with a company attempting to make money off of the secondary market sale of their products, but this is exactly what the purpose of the Masters Sets is.
Imagine if you will, this decorative plates some people's mothers buy to hang on the living room wall (my mom has a bajillion of them). Now, all the plates are manufactured, and sold to distributors for the same price. A plate made this week, will sell to the distributors for the same price as a plate made last month. The only time the price will change is when the cost of production increases, and this makes sense. If it costs more money to make the thing, you have to charge more money to sell it. Now imagine the company that makes these plates decides that they're going to reproduce a plate with the same artwork as one they did 20 years ago. It's an old design, so they haven't sold them in years, but the secondary market value of them is high. It doesn't cost them anything extra to make the plate with this design, but because they are aware of the cost of them on the secondary market, they charge distributors a hell of a lot more for them. So let's say instead of $10/plate, they are not charging $25 per plate. They are selling the product for 250% of the value, but the production costs have not gone up at all. So in essence, they are getting $15 free profit off of each of these plates. Well, the reason these plates were expensive on the secondary market were because there weren't a lot of them. But now that there are more out there, the secondary market value goes down. Well because it's gone down, distributors aren't going to want to pay $25 for them anymore. In fact, distributors may have to sell them at a loss just so they don't have to store the stock in a warehouse. So the company that made the plates makes a huge profit, and the distributors more than likely take not a huge, but a substantial loss. Well the plate company decides to once again release an old plate. They produce as much as they did last time, since everyone bought them in droves. Only this time no one busy nearly as many of them for $25. The distributors are worried about taking a loss just like last time, so they only buy a few. This means the company now needs to store them somewhere, or lower the price they wanted to sell at. They could just go down to the standard $10 again, since like stated before, it isn't costing them extras to make these fancy old-art plates. They're just jacking up the price because of the secondary market. Eventually this cycle continues until distributors just stop buying the products all together from the company because they are too expensive, and don't actually give distributors enough of a profit to justify their purchase.
This is the Masters Sets. They started off as a way for Wizards to give players better access to older cards. Then it turned into a game of a secondary market stock exchange. They are trying to see how low they can make the value of these sets before people just all together stop buying them. They are honestly just trying to throw consumer good will out the window with the attempt to squeeze every last desperate penny out of all of our wallets. And I mean sure, Wizards is a business, they need to make money. I understand that. But there is making money, and then there is trying to take advantage of your customers. Guess which of those are the sole purpose of the Masters sets.
Modern Decks:
UBG Lantern Control GBU
BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks
UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU
BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
I get there is going to be variance but when the packs are priced so much higher than a regular it feels so much worse. A regular draft isn't so bad if I open junk rares, I'm only out £10 but M25 could easily cost me three times that. It sucks because it seems like a fun set to draft but I just can bring myself to spend that much when there is such a low chance of getting close to the value in cards that I spent on the draft.
With such a high variance in pacs I expect people will find themselves in the "need or greed" position; do I want the ideal card for my deck or the valuable off-color rare? With the price of entry so high I would probably have to go with the expensive card to offset the cost of the draft. I get this is a problem with every set, but again it is multiplied by the cost of the booster.
That reminds me..why the **** wasn't TNN in this set?
UBBreya's Toybox (Competitive, Combo)WR
RGodzilla, King of the MonstersG
-Retired Decks-
UBLazav, Dimir Mastermind (Competitive, UB Voltron/Control)UB
"Knowledge is such a burden. Release it. Release all your fears to me."
—Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
Good question, but it would have to be mythic. Even at rare it would wreck limited.
My 720 Peasant Cube
I think the last four words of your comment explain why it wasn't in the set.
Modern Decks:
UBG Lantern Control GBU
BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks
UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU
BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
Explain your logic please? I'm having a hard time understanding why wotc can't print cards for $10 booster packs that have a decent chance of not turning into a $00.25 wasted lottery ticket.
Are you saying that overprinting boosters at a HIGH price point with LITTLE return on investment is better than selling boosters at an MSRP that is closer to the expected value of the cards inside?
Wizards reprinted Jace to sell m25 because they knew that the rest of the set was garbage, without a mythic Chase card they wouldn't have a chance of selling this set for his price.
Right now, this looks to me like a bunch of $10 lottery tickets. After all, each card is worth exactly 1/15 of the pack MSRP right?
Basically, the secondary market gets flooded with cards that are not seeing play in the competitive meta whenever these sets get released while the competitive cards get stuck at mythic and never really reach the market except for a short period of time. This is why the game makers of pokemon take care to print these cards in collector tins, as it's impossible to get them in any other fashion without paying through the nose. I still don't understand why they don't make 50 dollar collector tins with Mox Opal, Scalding Tarn, etc as the face card, put a booster pack in, maybe a anniversary collectors pin, and call it a day.
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!
(Is that you Rudy from Alpha Investments?)
I wholeheartedly disagree. Its a scam at that price. If I was seriously looking to buy a box at this time I wouldn't pay a dime more than 150 and even then it might be overpaying. Look at Iconic box prices and you see where this set is going. I'll pick up a box 4 to 6 months out for 120 to 140 shipped. It will happen, don't overpay for this junk.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Modern I believe is the one format that can consistently have that demand and require such action. Legacy to a smaller extent. Cards purely meant for commander (lands included) are going to drop a lot as a 1-of in a casual format is not the demand of a 4-of in a competitive format.
Their failing is not understanding this when considering secondary market value for these sets. This would be okay though if the cards were not $7 a pack. And yes, they are throwing out too many masters products to make this sustainable at this pace.
The Unidentified Fantastic Flying Girl.
EDH
Xenagos, the God of Stompy
The Gitrog Monster: Oppressive Value.
Marchesa, Marionette Master - Undying Robots
Yuriko, the Hydra Omnivore
I make dolls as a hobby.
They said around not more than. Idealy you want to pull ABOUT the value of the pack in product. Their will always be varrances but idealy, you want to spend X and get X dollars of cards. It almost never works out this way due to real world market/supply demand but ideal, each pack should have APROX value= the contents inside. Not more (then no one would ever sell packs) but as clost to retail as possable. You don't want "swingy $50 mythics" you want hoards of $3-5 rares. (in a normal set, if we assume that the commons/uncommons have neglitable value) as low risk as possable, lots of power spread around lots of cards allow the value to be soaked up evenly.
I'm also tired of the "but limited design!" Argument. I don't know if it's just their go-to excuse, or if they really are that concerned with standardizing their linited play experience but... Sets were fun to draft prior to current limited design structure, and I personally feel like wizards spends too much time engineering limited archetypes rather than letting them evolve naturally. Original ravnica block was the most fun I ever had in draft, and it wouldn't make it by today's design standards.