MTG Salvation

Fusion hit the nail on the head. It's never bad to own fetch lands, but seeing how they're the infrastructure for a significant portion of decks in the format, reprints are essentially a matter of when rather than if, so I'd advise against buying into them at/near their respective all-time highs unless you have immediate plans to use them. Although, there is a silver lining if you're ebay savvy and have the time to periodically check for new listings. I'm in the process of unloading a large amount of Modern staples and it's been interesting to see the disconnect between buyers & sellers, especially in regards to enemy fetches.

Whenever I list cards on eBay I'll undercut TCGplayer lows with the BIN price and generally accept any offer that's 10-15% less; I've done it the same way for years and my listings rarely make it longer than 5 days before they're sold out (assuming the card listed is a format staple holding value). So I've found it intriguing that out of everything I've listed over the last 2-ish weeks, sales of Tarns, Misty, and Catacombs have been the most stagnant. Over that time, I've been tracking the recently sold listings pretty close along with stores/aggregate pricing trends (MTGoldfish, MTGS, SCG, etc) which continue to show enemy fetches increasing in value and it became clear that those three "upper tier" enemy fetches are at/very close to the max price players are willing to pay. It's not an issue of decreased consumer demand as several Tarns, for example, get sold for $80-$85 a pop every day, rather, it's an issue pertaining to a lopsided distribution of supply where enough of these cards have found their way into the hands of the big players in the secondary market, so any significant de-stock -> price increase by someone like a SCG is enough to inflate the market of that particular card as a whole (or those 3 cards in this example).

Now the reason I find this so interesting is because the current uncertainty regarding Horizons/ when/where fetches will inevitably get reprinted makes it, so one can make persuasive arguments for both the sellers unwilling to budge due to a potential format-wide interest spike post-horizons as well as the buyers who refuse to pay $100 /Tarn, b/c they know a reprint announcement could pop up at any time. Went a little far down the finance path on that one, but the overarching point was to explain that you can certainly find Catacombs for a (somewhat more) reasonable price if you're willing to stake out ebay's newly listed auctions page and/or make reasonable offers on BIN posts.

I can think of a few matchups where I'd might want to side him in; at least worth testing seeing he's uncommon and won't break the bank. My first thought went to how he could help us vs Phoenix decks via taxing their spells and buying some time to find a Path before TiTi flips. The PW ability specifying damage dealt by any permanent seems like it could lead to some shenanigans. I definitely think it'd be fun to jam him in the SB for a few games and play around with him, but I ultimately feel like he's just too awkward between needing 3 mana to cast, requiring we be in a situation where it'd be the right call to pause our gameplan to play him, the inherit awkward hands you'd encounter if running more than a singleton, etc. Regardless, I'm kinda looking forward to giving him a whirl and seeing how it goes, especially if there's a non-zero chance he could be useful in the Phoenix/TiTi matchup. Because my Mirror Entity experiment hasn't been going as well as I had hoped lol.

Solid start to the day. Stopped by my mom's house this morning to set up a desktop in the den/what used to be my room as kid. I wanted to clear out some old junk while I was there and I was pleasantly surprised to find my old 'Beatdown Box'. I was under the impression that all of the cards I had as a kid were thrown away/donated back when I started undergrad, but I found a pretty nostalgic mix of mostly 2003-2010 cards as well as an affinity deck I built back in 2004 and the last one I built before taking a hiatus. Shows how much I knew back then as I found Sword of Light and Shadow Sword of Fire and Ice & a Tarn just hanging out amongst a patch of bulk rares, while my prized card at the time, Mythic Proportions, was the star of the deck haha. Certainly sweet to find the swords and tarn, but rifling through misc Mirrodin / Darksteel bulk was a real treat; really brought me back.

Interesting. I suddenly have an itch to jam Rugged Prairies + SSGs again lol

Quote from pierrebai »

Quote from Joban8 »

That's 24 Modern-relevant reprints from an entire set dedicated to Modern and 225 cards that are either draft chaff or irrelevant to competitive Modern. That's far from an efficient reprint strategy; WotC's comments regarding their ability to reprint more Modern staples across X amount of misc supplemental sets, products, etc seem much more reasonable considering they have two years worth of products in which they would have to scatter those 24 reprints across.

1. Given the number of rares and mythics in a set, that's actually a fair number. There are only so many common staples.
2. MM and other product never were at odds except in Wizards' twisted rethoric. Printing staples in one product never did prevent printing differnet staples in another.
3. Wizards has vowed to reprint cards in normal products repeatedly, while failing to do so in meaningful numbers.

1. That number includes cards like Vines of Vastwood, Mutagenic Growth, Mirran Crusader, Bolt, Swans of Bryn Argoll, etc; I tried to be generous by including anything that might've been in a tournament list within the last 4 years, including Twin. And exactly; the fact that there are only so many common/uncommon staples is a great example for why dedicating an entire set to the purpose of reprinting 24 Modern-relevant cards is less efficient than jamming those cards into other products over the same 2 year time span and use that R&D on something else, Like Modern Horizons.
2. & 3. As mentioned, what WotC recently promised and whether or not we should accept it at face value is a whole conversation unto itself. WotC hasn't given me much reason to defend them in recent years, so I rarely do, but I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt on this one. Charging players more money for less cardboard is a profitable gig, and since I find it hard to believe WotC just doesn't like easy money, it makes sense to think there's some truth to their logic.

Quote from Colt47 »

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Why didnt wizards print Modern Masters 2019?
Thats so stupid of them imo
They could sell modern staples at $10 per piece of paper
Now players complain and counterfeiters get a free season of printing Jace, Opal, Liliana, fetches and so on

I think horizons will bring them more money than another masters set easily. If even 2 new cards are staples in modern that’ll be enough to sell tons of packs as it’s the only way to get them.

i dunno, i dont think there is enough information about production costs to make this assumption. choosing a set of reprints-only adhering to some theme seems quite a bit easier than designing entirely new cards and testing them. horizons will cost more than standard sets with a premium attached, but still falls short of the ludicrous margins masters had despite (or maybe because) of their 'limited print' nature.

as for the original question, the simple and reductive answer is that the masters series wasnt sustainable. too many competing interests, and the product either had to adapt or move aside for something new.

They're bringing it back. Wizards of the Coast has a very predictable pattern with how they do things: Find a successful something, and then do it until people are so sick of it that they start turning into raving lunatics on social media and have to cart out some new popular voice of reason to tell everyone they are fixing things. Then they "fix magic" and proceed to run the new direction into the ground.

There is just too much untapped potential in modern and commander cards to not cash in on it. They are just making a strategic retreat to let the market settle down and recover from the insanity printing levels they did the last few years.

Whether or not we should take the comments at face value or not is a different conversation, but they've already stated how MM did more to suppress Modern reprints than promote them and going forward they'll be able to reprint more Modern staples now that MM is decommissioned. Folks keep asking how will they be able to reprint Modern cards without a Modern Masters set every 2 years, which seems like a legitimate concern at first glance, but if we look back to the set lists as a whole, we can clearly see how inefficient they were.

Using MM15 as an example, 249 cards were in the set and as of today there are 48 cards currently worth more than $1. Out of those 48 cards, less than half are Modern staples or see fringe Modern play; the other half are holding value due to Legacy or EDH play. That's 24 Modern-relevant reprints from an entire set dedicated to Modern and 225 cards that are either draft chaff or irrelevant to competitive Modern. That's far from an efficient reprint strategy; WotC's comments regarding their ability to reprint more Modern staples across X amount of misc supplemental sets, products, etc seem much more reasonable considering they have two years worth of products in which they would have to scatter those 24 reprints across.

IMO, Modern's mana base is the only major obstacle to this sort of reprint strategy, namely fetch lands. However, I wouldn't be surprised to see enemy fetches show up in a future Standard set despite how problematic that may be; if Arena continues to perform well despite the inevitable clunkers of standard set(s) then I can see WotC caring much less about how fetch lands/shuffling affect gameplay.

Any significant changes to the meta via bans prior to June 14 would be highly unlikely. Again, 250+ new cards will be dumped into the format and the meta will absolutely change as a result. Instilling a ban now would be as useful as re-roofing a house scheduled for demolition.

Quote from SaltySips »

Please, let‘s not discuss *that* topic again - the conversation gets destructive very fast and nobody seems to gain anything out of it.

As much as I‘d like to see Sylvan Library in Modern, with Ancient Stirrings being criticised whenever some colourless deck does well I‘d seriously doubt that we‘ll get such a toy in green.

That's because drawing stirrings is almost always a good thing for those decks until they have tron online. Drawing into multiple Sylvan Libraries would be brutal assuming your opponent isn't running enchantment hate; 4 life per card is a hefty price in a format where mana bases are largely composed of fetches and shocks. I honestly think it wouldn't only be underpowered in Modern, but underplayed as well. Aside from brews/decks in green with no other source of CA, what current deck would play it and furthermore, what deck would want to play more than 1 - 2 copies max?

I haven't read the comments from Maro, but I'd like to do so if anybody has the link handy. I could certainly see the brand new cards adhering to color pie norms, but knowing a chunk of the set will be ported over from legacy's card pool, I'd be surprised if "conforms to color pie" was a major deciding factor for whether or not those cards were chosen/excluded. WotC announcing MH would include reprints pre-8th ed was the first step toward the sort of "legacy-lite" format folks have described in the past; the extent to which that is true will seemingly depend on how many of these reprints are noteworthy cards in legacy. Aside from gameplay factors, the inclusion of cards like a Sylvan Library would go a long way to ensure MH has perceived value from the get-go. They can re-print all the Counterspells, Daze, etc they'd like for Modern, but dirt-cheap reprints won't sell pack and neither will unproven/untested cards (at least during the early stages when players are still figuring out whats actually relevant). Don't get me wrong, I'd be delighted if MH boxes are the same price as a standard set box, but that's unlikely to be the case. Making sure X amount of the reprints are legacy staples with modest-solid value is a sensical business decision that would help to ensure MH sales figures meet expectations; there has to be something among the set of uncertainty that would justify the premium/semi-premium price point of boosters/boxes.

Quote from Colt47 »

Quote from Joban8 »

I agree that the bubble for PW-centric cards will likely burst, but there's still a good 1-2 months left for those values to inflate. Strix can be re-printed (for the 7th time) in MH, so I'd definitely suggest ditching your copies while folks are still willing to pay $10 a pop. However, Zen fetches will not be in MH or any set within the foreseeable future, so selling now would be extremely premature IMO. Tarn may have hit/come close to it's all time high, but the others have just started making their way up to new highs. Even in the most conservative scenario where one thinks MH might introduce a land cycle that somehow makes fetches less desirable, I wouldn't begin to think about offloading them until the week or so before spoilers are set to debut.

It's best to set a threshold for the price point to sell, rather than waiting for the peak to come. The only way to know the peak is hit is to see the price start to fall, and at that point it is too late. Someone might lose out on a few extra dollars short term, but the long term is what is important.

Agreed, but that same logic works both ways; sell too early and you're just leaving money on the table. In regards to zen fetches, it's just common sense. What're the odds they'll be reprinted between now and MH spoiler season? Nearly 0%. Is there reason to believe demand will cease between now and then? Negative. Based on the all-time highs for each card, excluding Tarn, the average growth needed just to approach those all-time highs is about 36%; since we know what people have been willing to pay in the past, we're not blindly watching their value increase with no reasonable expectations for a ceiling value. Therefore, if you wanted to sell your zen fetches while both maximizing profit and minimizing risk, the week before MH spoilers is a logical time to do so. That's just being conservative; there's a good chance that MH will only push demand further post-release and we could see prices climb well throughout the Summer into Fall.

Quote from AUTUMNTWILIGHT »

Well I hope they know something about War of the Spark or Modern Horizons that we don't cause I don't see this being self corrected.

They do; they know 250 legacy/built-for-modern cards will be dumped into the format three months from now. Any qualms with the format will fall on deaf ears, because the announcement of MH included an expiratory date being slapped onto the lifespan of the current meta. Since 2015, roughly 1/3 of the discussion in this thread has been empty rhetoric about the banning of one single card and how that incident is the root cause for all things ***** in Modern. Thus, it's reasonable to argue that any complaints regarding perceived issues with the present format are irrelevant until we see what happens in t-minus three months when Modern is blasted in the ass with not one, but 250 new cards.

This set is basically a standard set. Futuresight 2.0.

I'm absolutely glued to this spoiler season so I can say, "SEE, I TOLD YOU SO!" to absolutely ******* nobody; it's actually quite unhealthy. I'm not usually expecting much if anything from spoilers and sets, but WOTC and the community have hyped this set up so much as being a second coming that I expected my archetype not to be fed hot garbage.


Like, as of now, Jund, Rock, Shadow have still received nothing. Abzan received a card, but Abzan has so many fundamental issues as of now it doesn't matter. I also think Kara's Guile is more of an esper card not Abzan. God knows the 3 drop slot in that deck is already filled with too much.

I just want a god damn good card, and so far most of Tuesday's big spoilers is already done with. So far Yawgmoth and a 3/3 undead dude isn't doing it. Neither is an unplayable snow deluge (not enough product).

Quote from Joban8 »

So it's Academy Ruins for enchantments, thoughts?

Not fun to see in your opening hand, but maybe it has a place in the SB?

We can't afford to play any colorless lands so this would have to go in a spell slot and it doesn't really seem worth it. We're quite limited on mana so very difficult to return something and play it in the same turn even. Just way too slow and don't see many cases where this would win you a game where a powerful aura like Unflinching Courage wouldn't do better.

Also new removal spell:



Could potentially be interesting if you want more removal spells than 4 Path to Exile. Only working if you fetch a basic land is a bit awkward though, so who knows. Also not great against Ghost Quarter or other basic land destruction.

I haven't seen anything that helps with graveyard strategies yet, like I thought Containment Priest was a pretty sure include in this set, but maybe there will still be something like it? There's about 2 white cards that seem somewhat worth playing so far.

God, based off these black cards revealed in the spoilers midrange was definitely not in mind when horizon was being created.

These horrible 4 drop black creatures are barely playable

Is Future Sight reprint really necessary when Modern already has Magus of the Future I wonder?

Quote from Ym1r »

Nether Spirit reprint! This brings back memories of when I couldn't comprehend as a kid how you win with a stupid 2/2 creature and a bunch of spells! Now I only want Nantuko Shade and Cabal Coffers!

Nantuko Shade got reprinted in Magic 2011.

Quote from Joban8 »

So it's Academy Ruins for enchantments, thoughts?

Not fun to see in your opening hand, but maybe it has a place in the SB?

I’ve been testing 2x Noxious Revival in SB and I can tell you it was great in many matches. This land can make exactly the same effect and can’t be countered... will be probably very useful in a future metagame where opponents can destroy our auras at instant speed without paying any mana.

Crashing Footfalls is green Ancestral Rhinos, complete with 1-mana Suspend 4. Once it's finally cast, you get 2 4/4 green Rhino creature tokens with Trample. Will people want to Cascade this out early? Or will people Suspend it the fair way?

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I understand that many of you will disagree, but I have yet to see a single main deck playable level card spoiled from MH1, excluding the slivers and the canopy land cycle.

You mean that cards like Archmage's Charm Ranger-Captain of Eos, Force of Negation, Giver of runes, Fact or Fiction, Prohibit, Scale Up, Lava Dart, Wrenn and Six, Fallen Shinobi, Eladamri's Call, Ice-Fang Coatl, and Mox Tantalite, and that's just from the top of my head, are not maindeckable?

Yes, I meant that none of those seem maindeckable in today's modern metagame.

I may be wrong, as some of them seem borderline playable (maybe as a 1-2 of), but that's my initial assessment.

Your assessments are bad then. Lava dart is a big upgrade for phoenix decks, Scale up is a nice upgrade for infect at a minimum.

From my testing, the only Phoenix deck Lava Dart is a big upgrade for is Mono-Red Phoenix, which plays 8 Prowess creatures, really appreciates the ability to enable Spectacle (on Light Up the Stage) on two separate turns, and often plays at least 1 Bedlam Reveler that can discard it. As much as Thought Scour can mill Lava Dart in UR Phoenix, as much as Lava Dart flips Thing in the Ice faster, and as much as casting and flashing back Lava Dart when another Lava Dart is in the yard turns on Pyromancer Ascension by itself, Lava Dart didn't feel that much more powerful than any other burn spell in UR Phoenix.

Quote from Lord Seth »

Am I the only one who, when looking at this set, think "man, I really wish this was a Standard set"?

not really. it has a lot of cool stuff going on, and the complexity with all the mechanics showing up is nice. however gotta remember that we see these things as long-time enfranchised players. people playing standard, many of which are new and or are from arena, wouldnt get the references or the same sense of nostalgia. the set is very time spiral-esque, but there is a reason that wizards considered time spiral a failure on their part.

i do wish it costed as much as a standard set. the arbitrary price hike was absurd from the start, and nothing ive seen spoiled has changed that opinion.