Anyone who thinks they have a CLUE about MTG sales based on what they see anecdotally is being silly.
LGS may be selling less product lately, but big box stores are certainly selling more. Either way you better believe Hasbro wouldn't do it this way if it wasn't increasing sales. More people/kids with cards means more players long term. Just takes them time to find the LGS (i bought a TON of cards from local shops before i even knew of any lgs as a kid)
Because people like playing with those cards and like playing those decks that aren't dominating the format at all. Affinity is not a problem, Ad Nauseam is not a problem, Grishoalbrand is not a problem, RW Prison is not a problem, Living End is not a problem Lantern Prison is not a problem although it's a unwanted deck amongst Modern players is not a problem.
If you kill those cards, you kill certain strategies, you kill certain decks, heavily nerf others for no apparent reason, destroy player base confidence since those decks are not breaking any rule now.
What you don't understand, is that they will be problems. Look at Golgari Grave-Troll, it was legal for over a year. Then in one block we got Cathartic Reunion, Insolent Neonate, and Prized Amalgam, then poof, GGT is now overpowered. By the way, just randomly losing turn 2 to Grishoalbrand is still just as stupid as turn 3 storm. They may not happen often, but these high variance decks can make 8-12 round tournaments completely frustrating, by simple luck of the draw. In Legacy, we have aggressive methods to find reactive tools. in Modern you simply just pray. It's not fun specifically against some decks.
It's not the majority of cases, but the fact remains that some people are still out there saying they will play decks exactly like Grishoalbrand until Wizards just bans them.
Thank god for the return of the Modern PT, where lots of complaints which cannot be quantified with selective MTGO Data, will actually be put on the spotlight and be abused for everyone to see. I want another episode where Brian Kibler just simply walks away from his match and gets food while his combo player just plays a whole round. Modern is still in that exact bullcrap state, it's just that we have a balanced metagame of it.
I want to see pro's tilt on turn 3 tron, turn 3 storm, turn 5 Scapeshift, and turn 4 burn. We need way better cards than Fatal Push to make this format somewhat navigable for competitive play.
Dredge was never even dominant with GGT legal. That ban was almost as silly as the Twin ban. Twin, GGT, Stoneforge and BBE are ALL super safe to unban imo. None of them are part of degenerate strategies.
Dredge is just too easy to hate on to be 'broken' in modern. The meta will adjust and quickly with GY hate.
Does anyone have a competitively tuned decklist currently? I recently got pretty much all the cards for the deck assembled (besides my only having one liliana of the veil), and tried throwing a deck together. However, I'm not a great builder, and I haven't been performing very well at the shop. With that in mind, I was wondering if anyone had a decent base list to share. Additionally, I was wondering about a few matchups. Jund having Bob and Kommand lets them grind me out with ease, and olivia voldaren tends to wreck me if I can't answer it right away(something hard to do when everything they have is a huge threat), how do I win that matchup? Also, Tron. How do I have any chance there besides just running 4 ghost quarter and hoping for the best?
Edit: I've only been running 2 Death clouds because it feels weak most of the times I draw it, but does destroy lands and potentially do a lot of damage vs. Jund, could that be the key?
If your death cloud list doesn't want to draw death cloud your deck doesn't make any sense. Play something different. After you death cloud you should win with a planeswalker, or a leftover token, or manland.
Why is someone who is claiming to be a troll making videos crying about people judging him on it? If hes a troll he got the attention he wanted. Shouldn't be getting butthurt that people decided to troll him back by getting him banned.
1. Putting rares that people want at higher rarity and into luxury sets.
2. The destruction of the color wheel and "mono-color matters" to push dual lands as lottery tickets.
3. No exclusive Modern support to keep prices down.
4. 90% of standards sets consisting of Limited fodder and the rest are chased rares costing $30-$50.
5. No world-building in unified design/boring mechanics.
Agreed with most of this, especially number 4. They 'push' less than 10 cards per set it feels, and the rest they seem too careful. They focus too much on limited and not enough on standard. Standard just isnt varied/fun enough. I like the ixalan art/themes, so lets hope the next set ups the power level a bit.
Number 1 is probably likely to continue going forward, as its more profitable to make these chase masters sets and sell tons of those as well. Problem is they are running out of overpriced cards to reprint. They hit a TON of staples with Iconic. Watch out Liliana of the Veil, you are DUE for a reprint... maybe even in standard?
Hey I get it, its like opening up a restaurant really.
But I know Blizzard released data even when it wasnt good data.
I cant find anything from Wizards of the coast in the same vein, like you said they can assured track how many stories are buying from them and I dont think it would that impossible for them to have an estimate about how many people buy their product.
And maybe Im just not finding it, but if its not out there, why wouldnt they release it?
Funny you say that because blizzard stopped releasing WoW sub numbers to the public when they got around 5m because of the negative impact on the stock. Blizzard is VERY conscious about what info it releases.
People in here need to step back from the ledge. MTG revenue is at/near an all time high. Yeah maybe the standard scene isn't at its best lately, which comes back to development focusing TOO much on limited and not enough on standard. Either way the game will always ebb and flow but the trend is UP, and games like hearthstone actually help MTG become more mainstream.
People need to relax and just play magic. The issue with desolatormagic and this Jeremy guy is they don't even PLAY magic. I watch their videos and they just rant about liberals/politics and pretend its an MTG channel.
If you want to grow the game keep the politics out of this and just play. Of course WOTC is going to target the smaller female demo to increase the size of the game. Thats just good business.
Yeah, Stax is not universally accepted in EDH, and even among those of us who do enjoy playing against it, we often don't want to do so every game. I wouldn't suggest your first deck be a Stax one, especially if you don't know the meta you're going to be playing in.
Hmm suggestions then? I like disruptive strategies, Mardu is my preferred color combination. I like some graveyard recursion, land destruction, that kind of stuff. Pox and the like.
I would support a format where ALL cards printed with the M15 frame in ANY product are legal.
But I believe the next non-rotating format, if there is one, will be BFZ onwards and include only Standard sets.
This format would be dominated by Collected Company. Card is way above anything else theyve printed lately at 4 mana AND instant speed.
Hey guys never played any Commander before... Not sure the size of my local meta(decent size city/store) but do you think Its bad form to be a new guy playing Stax? Is it common in metagames? It seems like such an annoying/unfun deck to play against (the fun part for us).
Not sure why you're linking general Hasbro links.. if you listen to their conference call you will see they are quite happy with MTG and continue to invest heavily in it. Its certainly NOT the toy group thats performing poorly. Yes iconic masters is a bit of a flop but MM 2017 was certainly a HUGE success as far as sales go.
The sales of MTG products are better than ever according to Hasbro conference calls. They are sure to SPECIFICALLY call out strength in MTG in the calls. Now could this be partially due to masters sets? A bit, but clearly the game is still strong... and players will wax and wane.
As noted 2 of the big factors are - Casuals are cracking most of the standard legal packs(other than FNM which is a decent value for anyone) and Hearthstone and other competing card games.
I'm just glad I live in Canada where people are sane and pretty much unanimously hate Trump. Even the right wing conservatives here support gay marriage, abortion, access to birth control, etc. We have ascended past such silly topics so I don't expect many of these 'edgy' types in my lgs luckily!
Do we even have evidence he plays the game? Tournament results? He just uses MTG as a soapbox to complain like Desolatormagic about the 'left wing' influences in the game
If guys like Jeremy weren't weirdo creeps because of their lack of ability/success with women we likely wouldn't hear him complaining about them.
You don't see many alt right *****lords with girlfriends lets just say. Guys like me that are happily getting laid 10+ times a week don't worry about who's cosplaying or who is a 'sjw'.
LGS may be selling less product lately, but big box stores are certainly selling more. Either way you better believe Hasbro wouldn't do it this way if it wasn't increasing sales. More people/kids with cards means more players long term. Just takes them time to find the LGS (i bought a TON of cards from local shops before i even knew of any lgs as a kid)
Dredge was never even dominant with GGT legal. That ban was almost as silly as the Twin ban. Twin, GGT, Stoneforge and BBE are ALL super safe to unban imo. None of them are part of degenerate strategies.
Dredge is just too easy to hate on to be 'broken' in modern. The meta will adjust and quickly with GY hate.
Modern STILL has tons of undiscovered decks that can compete with the best. Its up to YOU to find them and break the format.
If your death cloud list doesn't want to draw death cloud your deck doesn't make any sense. Play something different. After you death cloud you should win with a planeswalker, or a leftover token, or manland.
Tit for Tat, eye for an eye.
Agreed with most of this, especially number 4. They 'push' less than 10 cards per set it feels, and the rest they seem too careful. They focus too much on limited and not enough on standard. Standard just isnt varied/fun enough. I like the ixalan art/themes, so lets hope the next set ups the power level a bit.
Number 1 is probably likely to continue going forward, as its more profitable to make these chase masters sets and sell tons of those as well. Problem is they are running out of overpriced cards to reprint. They hit a TON of staples with Iconic. Watch out Liliana of the Veil, you are DUE for a reprint... maybe even in standard?
Funny you say that because blizzard stopped releasing WoW sub numbers to the public when they got around 5m because of the negative impact on the stock. Blizzard is VERY conscious about what info it releases.
If you want to grow the game keep the politics out of this and just play. Of course WOTC is going to target the smaller female demo to increase the size of the game. Thats just good business.
Hmm suggestions then? I like disruptive strategies, Mardu is my preferred color combination. I like some graveyard recursion, land destruction, that kind of stuff. Pox and the like.
This format would be dominated by Collected Company. Card is way above anything else theyve printed lately at 4 mana AND instant speed.
As noted 2 of the big factors are - Casuals are cracking most of the standard legal packs(other than FNM which is a decent value for anyone) and Hearthstone and other competing card games.