How Wizards Of The Coast Sabotaged Double Masters 2022 | Magic: The Gathering
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- Опубликовано: 11 сен 2024
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Money money money in my huge lairs.
I did a draft, and brought a single Top. The draft was fun, even though I went 1-2. I am done with the set
Hey Prof. Not sure if you'll see this, but I wanted to flag it anyway.
'Wellness' apps like Noom are absolutely infamous in the eating disorder community for the damage that they do; people with orthorexia are especially vulnerable to them, and it's gotten bad enough that one of the first things you get asked at intake is whether you're using one of those apps. They feed into obsessive behaviors around found, and the way they encourage you to 'track' what you eat and how much you exercise is basically trains your brain to start thinking in a way that EDs tell you to think, and I can't tell you how many women and girls I met in treatment that ended up in residential treatment because the obsessive tracking these apps encourage either triggered an episode or created a problem that ended up requiring treatment.
I would really encourage you to reach out to psychiatrists and social workers who specialize in EDs, as well as people who struggle with EDs, to get another perspective on these apps. The wellness industry is a scourge, and part of why it's so insidious is how well it positions itself as "healthy" and "nonjudgmental" while encouraging obsessive behavior, creating problems that can only be 'solved' by using their services or buying their food.
If nothing else, I think it's a serious enough issue that these ads need a content warning attached to them. For a lot of people, getting away from these apps was incredibly difficult work, and being exposed to them again can be deeply triggering. I know that I had to skip the ad section because I started to have a panic attack, and I never even used a wellness app as part of my illness. I can't imagine how upsetting it would be for someone who had.
Anyway, I just wanted to throw this out there as something to consider. I know it sounds absolutely insane to someone who's never been involved in ED treatment and I'm sure I explained badly! But I think that's why reaching out to a professional in ED treatment might be good, as I"m sure they could explain better, or at least provide a more nuanced perspective than the Noom PR team probably did. I lovelove this channel and the work you do and the idea that I'd have to have my partner screen your videos for me because you're running Noom ads really would suck.
$12 Draft??? Where do those exists? I'll need to get my DeLorean.
The only reason WotC has to charge premium prices for these sets is that they can, that we’ll pay it. Masters sets require fewer resources, have lower costs to develop, and should in reality cost the same or less than regular sets. Masters sets don’t require a creative team to develop a setting, lore and story. Masters sets mostly recycle existing art, whereas new sets contain only new art which costs MUCH more. The limited print runs of Masters sets are a choice, not a problem WotC has to deal with, so scarcity is also no excuse for higher prices. Masters sets are increasingly predatory.
True that
A+
Couldn't agree more. If you want to play the magic the gathering card game, wizards has a monopoly on the game pieces, and they know that. They will squeeze for ever last ounce they can get away with.
At least they remember to put on their rainbow and "I support the current thing" shirts on in time for marketing.
Step 1 is to recognize that you are in an abusive relationship with Hasbro. Step 2 is to break that relationship by no longer buying into their premium products!
It's easy to be cynical when dockside litterally says "It's just bussines" on the card. Wizards is self aware.
That flavour text is really funny to me.
I'm considering proxying my dockside into new art with the text, "It's just paper."
Why would WotC try to make the game better for players when they can make money for the (already) wealthy investors instead? Rich people need more money. The game is not as important to them.
@@billdoetsch then do it. Wizards doesn’t care how much you cry about it in comment sections
Yeah that flavor text is hilarious. It's so true and it displays perfectly why they are content with the way it's going and why many of us aren't. The new dockside is basically art, it's ugly, it's cherished, it's wanted, it's disputed and it makes a perfect statement for either party to dumb down what they base their feelings on
As a former store owner I wholeheartedly blame WOTC and their allocation process as well as these cash grabs for the downfall of my store. The majority of my customers were all lower income but lived the game so much they would spend their hard earned cash at my store to get great packs especially for draft. However, I was never allocated enough to cover demand because I was a low earner store. Never enough boxes, never enough prize support and definitely never enough help in maintaining a healthy player base. My s customers loved it when they knew if they spent $15 for a draft that they a chance at a beautiful masters print of a great card and at the very least they walked away with good prize support and the memory of a good time. I couldn’t imagine how I would be able to continue to cultivate a good atmosphere and provide product that my customers could afford with the pricing they are doing now. Hell, even the biggest shop in our area is struggling to keep its doors open.
I hear many similar stories from many current and former store owners.
Stores are caught between WotC and the players. Drafters now have arena, and other players are told right here by prof to "buy singles, buy singles." I know Prof loved the LGS, but come on, you're killing us. I'm sure the Card Kingdoms of the world love you, but small and medium stores don't get enough value or supply to crack boxes for "value." Our singles come from trade ins. If no one cracks packs, we have no supply. You may not intend it, Prof, but you, Kenobi, and the other streamers championing this are killing pack sales.
Once you add this to having a local premium store that is now starting to be allowed special events or extra events, and it's getting hard.
I'm fortunate. The place I work has a smart owner and a supportive player base in a gaming hotbed, but if this continues there will be a tipping point.
Today my LGS told me that the distributors are increasing the prices to the stores based on demand. They can no longer count on the price given to them at the first order to stay the same on the next order of the same product. So now they're stuck between risking over-ordering a product now, or paying extra to get more later. And since the price usually goes up on future orders, their margins go even lower. It's just not worth it.
You in Florida? This sounds exactly like our old LGS, Gathering Games. I miss having a community for Magic.
@@zombeezy7161 nope. Ohio
I’m so glad we have a widely visible member of the community that actually voices the opinions of the community, as opposed to being more lenient or just pretending there’s no problem entirely so they get sent all of the preview cards and whatnot.
When I watched this video, I was struck by one of the reasons I just can't convince myself to buy back into magic. I can buy a computer game for $20 to $60; if I spend 20 hours with it, I feel like I've gotten my money's worth. If I spend $200 to $1,000 on a deck and I find that it's not really for me, well I could have bought tens or hundreds of other games for that price. From a value proposition, Magic just isn't worth it anymore.
This isn't a new problem for Magic, but it's certainly a persistent one, and it only seems to be getting worse.
In my playgroup it’s ok to play for some time full proxy deck until you feel the deck is how you like it. And if you don’t want to play competitive you could say with your playgroup maximum deckprices of 150 € for example.
I have a solution ✨proxies✨ (while also supporting woc by buying packs)
This is why most people I play with have no problem with proxies. I have most EDH staples but if I build a deck (which I tear down after a couple months) has non staple cards in it I just run a proxy. But you could just buy a precon which these days is pretty strong is casual metas and have a good time for less than $100
@@piss5061 Or just proxy and refuse to support WOtC and their greed. Don’t support something that is inherently broken.
i love when i can build my deck with real cards but the reality is that prices of staples in any format have skyrocketed so i just use proxies.
it's a different thing when an old card is expensive because, well, it's old and have high collectors value and when manufactured scarcity and power creep makes it expensive. the latter is unacceptable so i will continue to use proxies until cards become reprinted at affordaple pricepoint and i suggest everyone to do the same.
I walked into a local game store today and saw a foil full art marnie from pokemon tcg in the case, listed for over 4k yen. Thats roughly $30 or so in the US. The normal version of the card is 30 cents. The case was filled with dozens of other pokemon tcg cards of similar prices, with the normal versions of those cards all likewise being under $1. I don't know how good Marnie is in actual gameplay, but I think that regardless that price difference is very indicative of something: that you can have the regular game pieces of your game be dirt cheap while the collectible versions of those cards are very expensive and desired. Obviously the branding of pokemon is more sought after by non-players than magic product because its possibly the largest and most popular IP worldwide, but at the same time Magic as an IP is nothing to scoff at. Why are magic cards not treated in a similar fashion, with chase premium versions of cards being valuable and the regular game pieces needed to play standard, pioneer, modern and commander being relatively cheap?
This actually all circles back to the decline of competitive play and formats like standard, too: what incentive is there for a new magic player to play standard when their deck costs as much or more than a commander deck, and the standard deck rotates and is the overall less popular format? If Wizards wants standard and draft to be popular again so that they can sell more booster packs, maybe they should look at this root cause and address it.
Marnie has been a 2-4 of staple in the vast majority of standard decks in pokemon since its debut early 2020. Its first printing was a holo (mtg equivalent to mythic) then a rare in a special set 8 months later, then reprinted in almost every precon since. Even with those reprints the Japanese alt full art is over 100 dollars. Pokemon is just built different
@@MCDanGaming25 cool, yeah the normal copies were in the bulk bins for like ¥20.
Nope
Make more money off packs? Wizards/Hasbro just had their most profitable quarter in company history last month.
They aren’t going to change anything until they bleed it dry for their shareholders.
@@ozmond huh..?
This really goes beyond biting the hand that feeds.
I am willing to bet my entire collection that just about everyone here started playing Magic because someone already playing the game introduced them to it. The player base has always been the marketing team companies dream of and yet we are treated like this.
Nowadays whenever someone asks me about the card game I have to include a warning of how expensive it can be.
I just started playing MTG recently. After Covid, I realized how little interaction I had with other people and it was effecting me negatively. I started asking people I knew what they were doing to be more social. To my surprise, I found lots of friends were playing MTG. I started playing to have an outlet to do more things with people.
I always hate having to tell people that the game can be expensive. Because it can be a real huge turn off
Tell them to proxy
That's the unfortunate truth about most TCGs, but Magic in particular. Typically (But not always - I have cedh decks that only cost me ~$80) the higher the powerlevel of your playgroup, the more expensive your decks get. That's why I tend to either introduce people to the game via unmodified commander precons, of which I have a few to choose from for people to test out, or via Pauper.
To add to the warning of the cost, simultanously I point out how much fun it can be when you play with the cheaper cards and what is possible without spending a Fortune on the game
I remember when spoiler season started, I got really really excited. Then prices started coming out, and when I got told it was $15-17 per pack, it was a crushing disappointment to me. It got to a point I was completely apathetic to the release, since I knew I just couldn’t afford it, nor the singles I wanted to buy. If the boxes were normal price; I would have kept my excitement and bought a box to seek the cards o wanted
At 10$ a pack I would be lining up to draft this set over and over. It's super cool- great art, interesting cards and archetypes but - 50-60$ would buy you the majority of a mana base for a new commander deck.
This is exactly what I went through. As a returning player that unfortunately got rid of my collection about 8 years ago (Long Story) I thought this would be a chance to finally afford some singles I've been needing for my edh decks. It's tough for me to afford this hobby, but I love it to death. When I discovered the pricing I went from excited for the opportunity and chance, to feeling completely dejected. To players like me, this is more than just a money grabbing scheme. It's a complete lack of understanding a good portion of their player base.
It's too risky. At 5 or 6 bucks a pack its a bummer to get a shit rare, but it's whatever. In $12 packs it sucks for sure. At $18 though it hurts a lot more and it completely turns me off to the set. The idea that profit has to increase year over year means that, with mtg still increasing in popularity and profitability, there's simply no going back. I'm already burnt out on everything released recently.
I kicked myself for not ordering any boxes from Amazon when they were still around the $250 range. Though, I've also seen several people who ordered that early say they are STILL WAITING for said order. So wouldn't be surprised if they had those early purchases cancelled.
Still a waste of money though. Buy singles. Save up for reserved list cards. Print proxies. I’m sorry it’s not cheap to gamble it does suck I agree
More and more, unless you're playing in sanctioned events, you should just be proxying. WotC has made it clear that they don't want the game to be ~actually~ accessible to most of us.
And if you’re playing in sanctioned events, use high-quality knockoffs.
This.
Don’t feed the monster that kicks you down. Commander was the players format, not wizards. Ill play it my way paywall be damned.
@@Scantronimus466 Don't do this. If you're competing in a sanctioned event, you agree to follow the rules of that event. One of those rules is "no proxies." Breaking this rule may invalidate any potential winnings from events and could lead to a ban from future events. I agree that proxies should be used wherever they can, but sanctioned events are certainly a place they cannot.
We give no Single F. We proxy the shit out of everything. 60 cards, 200+ Bucks. This is something totally different.
It's really hard to find a reason not to when the card game you love to play intentionally decides to cultivate an environment where 75 bucks for a single piece of cardboard is normal
"Draft is not a one-time rare occurrence."
For some of us, it truly is.
Outside of online play, and my own Cube, I've only ever drafted a paper Magic product but a handful of times in the past 10 years. Of those, only a single time per set, and mostly auxiliary sets.
While I do enjoy the skill intensity and tension of Draft, I just hardly ever bother as it seems overwhelming when I imagine everyone at the table has drafted the set more times than I have.
It may be self sabotage, but it's 100% intentional and working as intended. They know that people will still buy all of the product, they just don't care.
People like alpha investments and their "this set is still underpriced" attitude certainly not helping.
The fallacy of success. Companies can fall into this trap when they are making increasing amounts of money and assume this must mean they are fundamentally making the right business moves. So they double down to make even more without the self introspection to understand WHY they are finding such success. I mean where’s the “need” to be introspective when you’re succeeding?
But the wise company knows the need for genuine introspection is independent of success or failure.
And there in lies the fallacy and trap. Business success has many factors and often only some are a result of your business’s decisions. In this case, WOTC is suffering from the same issue as other attractive and beloved IP’s such as Pokémon. Magic is indeed a fantastic experience. Customers are extremely loyal to IP’s like this and in the short to midterm will happily put up with subpar business decisions in order to keep interacting with their beloved IP for the cost of a tiny bit of their patience and trust with WOTC each time. They are will to do this not because of the companies awesome customer centric decisions but because their core product is unique and highly attractive. However, if those business decisions keep up, wide spread customer fatigue and mistrust will eventually set in and the IP will gravely suffer in the long run for it. Thus making WOTC less overall money in the long run as they fall for the trap of the fallacy of success.
Jumping from one product to the next one in no time, no blocks and constantly increasing prices will hurt deeply in the long run.
It's hurting the game now. I personally skipped more sets than I didn't, and I used to buy at minimum 1 draft box per set. Now I'm just saving for Unfinity, because un sets are my favorite
It's precisely why I dropped out of buying into the game once the marketing strategy changed to this hyper-accelerated new product push, with a new set every 2 to 3 months
When it comes to price, not all of the blame should be on WoTC tbh. Stores have some control in how expensive they want to make the products. As for so many sets… I’ve seen both sides of the coin on that. I am not disagreeing with your point, I would only like to play Devil’s Advocate. If let’s say there were four sets for the year: that would be one every three months. So what of it? Well, if the set for whatever the reason does horrible, then you would still have customers skipping the set and LGSs eating their losses. Having to wait half a year just because that one set was horrible is too much time to wait. Most would rather move on to the next set asap. Remember, not every set is going to be amazing. Look at any TCG. Pokémon sometimes makes really bad sets. They print it to oblivion anyways. The set tanks and you’re stuck waiting months in the hope of something better.
Will it really? It just seems that magic players will buy whatever wotc puts out, people have been complaining about this for a while now, yet in every circle I have everyone is like "oh boy I can't wait to get product x, y or z"
why ill be playing sorcery, they wanna do slow roll releases and actually give you breathing room and treat you like a person not some ivory tower rich person
Everything you’ve said is absolutely spot on. I’m as of writing this currently at Commandfest in Orlando. The event has been incredible but seeing vendors charging insane amounts of money on cards that were reprints in Masters 2022 has been insane. I’ve bought quite a bit from Masters 2022 as I’ve just started getting into higher power level decks but I’ve come to the conclusion from playing some tournaments this weekend that my decks at the top will not perform without some of the really expensive cards. Buying/making proxies for my personal play group is going to be the path I see fit for playing at that higher level. I don’t want to but, I simply can’t afford to play so many expensive cards to simply play at a higher level that won’t be at any tournament event.
Same...I don't go to tournaments, I sit at home with 8 friends play FFA or teams while smoking a blunt with sports in background ...been playing for over a decade...been making proxies for the past 2 years
It feels like since the mtg - 40k crossover was announced, both games have been learning and copying each other's worst ideas
Is there a 40k set incomimg?
Fair, but I’m less mad with GW these days. That balance data-slate did wonders and 7th Ed 40k is back in the form of Heresy! The price increases stink but I get more from them than I do WOTC.
@@thebattleofpelennorfieldsp6081 commander decks
@@thebattleofpelennorfieldsp6081 commander decks october (edited) (thanks everyone for letting me know)
@@girlhunter2102 GW like Wotc seems to do the whole one step forward two steps back. Heresy 2.0 was in mant ways a step forward, but not launching with placeholder rules for all factions (like 8th 40k) and the pdf for forgeworld units was terrible.
Did 3 drafts at an LGS for $35 each (Almost no prize support though) and the BEST card I got was an emrakul, which is around $20 right now, with a pile of couple-dollar rares/uncommons. Even with lower prices it's still so hard to get value due to the sheer amount of bulk flooding the set.
I can justify spending about 50 bucks a month in Magic. That usually means I get a fat pack or a commander precon. But between Baldur's Gate (which I was extremely hyped about) offering literally nothing to add to my collection, and Double Masters prices allowing me to buy only 2 boosters, I saw no point in bothering with either. Even Arena hasn't convinced me to get the battle pass this season, since they are focusing exclusively on alchemy Baldur's Gate! I can't believe I am saying this, but I've actually gone back to Hearthstone as my main card game for the first time since Ixalan.
This is a rational take. Once I realized I had too many commander decks, I didn't enjoy pre release anymore, and packs were too expensive to crack for fun, I just stopped buying produc.t
I only bought that pass because I need wildcards bad and I want to build up my supply for when Dominaria drops.
I’ve gone back to Hearthstone too and my Renothal wild deck is a ton of fun, and I haven’t spent a cent since returning.
I've gone back to Legends of Runeterra for my mobile TCG choice. Magic Arena is garbage. Arena's game algorithms ruin entire game mechanics and they FORCE wins and losses by creating a 50/50 win and lose game ratio for all players using its algorithms to pair you against decks that completely counter yours perfectly while giving your opponent perfect first few turn draws or if that doesn't work too well, the algorithm makes sure you don't draw your lands in the first turns that your need. There's literally no reason to play Arena for me because even if one wins I feel as though one won because Wizards gave one the win. I watch a RUclips Arena player who intentionally creates decks that trick Wizards game-fixing mechanics.
Man Arena really got killed by fucking Alchemy shit
I was kinda excited to pick up some Double Masters 2022 because, I was watching the spoilers and it promised to be a good set for commander reprints. But on day of release when I went down to my LGS to try and pick up some double masters 2022 packs and they had sold out on preorder, with confused word on whether or not there would be a second wave. Come on Wizards PRINT your game!
I simply could not afford the set. I wanted to draft it, I wanted to go to my local game store and get some limited games. But when the buy in was minimum of 60-70 dollars or more. I just simply couldn't justify that in my budget nor could I afford even a couple packs here and there.
It hurt to skip out on a set that has all the cards I want, and some cards I'd like to have or cards I could trade back for store credit or trade to friends. But I just can't justify spending 15-18 dollars on a booster pack with just 1 more card then usual.
I feel for ya. I'm in a similar boat. I had to pick between DM prerelease or the pioneer championship. I'm lucky because our draft was only $40.
Same here. It's just too expensive for a lot of us that don't have a ton of disposable income. Especially with rising fuel prices and inflation.
Fomo is real.
This set isn't for you. Wizards had in mind whom this set was for and you ain't it. Just be glad you didn't buy a 2x Masters draft box with the most expensive rare being a crucible of worlds, like what happened to me.
You should put a good chunk of the blame on your LGS for that. The set was the right price up until the spoilers came out and they wanted to capitalize by canceling orders and repricing.
I'm getting the same "exploit the addicted whales, fuck the rest of the player base" mentality that made me leave mobile gaming - I'm looking at you, Diablo. New to magic, so take this with a grain of salt. We're probably different, but here's no way in hell I'm dropping up to $20 on a single double master's pack to gamble for the *chance* of getting maybe something *useable* in the 99 of single deck when there's plenty of worthy $20 Indy games that will give you 40+ hours of enjoyable entertainment on Steam. I might be an amateur to MTG, but it doesn't take a genius to recognize a waste of time/energy/space, and maybe other MTG noobs like myself are seeing something similar. I appreciate your content, Professor. But there's only so much my filthy casual eyes can glaze over or roll deeper than Adele with release fatigue and price hikes.
A few points here... first, try Pauper. It's cheap and the gameplay is intense and strategic. Second, unpopular opinion, I like Diablo Immortal. I've been playing Diablo since the first one in the 90s, and it hasn't really changed fundamentally. There are monsters, go click on them until there aren't monsters, except more monsters will spawn, but you'll have the satisfaction of having clicked on the first ones. Here, put on these vorpal earmuffs, they'll help with the monster clicking. I did plenty of min-maxing in D3, and I found the gameplay doesn't really change much at higher levels with tricked-out builds, it's still just clicking monsters until they go away to get better earmuffs. So now I can do that but in bed and for free. Sure if I gave them money I could click on monsters with different stats but so what? I'm fundamentally disinterested in competing with other people in PvP or in who-can-click-the-most-monsters.
@@EliyaSelhub he didn’t ask you if you liked Diablo
@@EliyaSelhub Whether you enjoy it or not the pay to play systems are legitimately predatory. No one is coming after your enjoyment, they're coming after how abusive it is to both whales and ordinary players.
Let me recommend the MTGO Penny Dreadful format for a truly price gouging free MTG format.
Then don’t. Buy singles. Print proxies. It isn’t that deep bro
Point 1 is exactly why I spent my money on the singles I wanted, despite my saving up with the intention of purchasing a draft box to draft with my family. The tought of opening bulk mythics like ghave, mizzix, or karador in a 15$+ pack killed my excitment for this set and I feel sorry for the myriad of folks out there who bought a box full of 1-5$ mythics.
I did the same. The last minute I changed my mind and bought singles instead. My buddy got boxes and he did better out of the collectors packs vs. draft box for value.
As someone who opened and got a ghave you made the right decision, rip
I was excited for the set. Now I'm seeing all the cards I was excited about at $40+ still (the cool art treatments) and feel less excited. I bought a single collector booster just for fun, and pulled a bunch of bounce lands in my full art slots. What a ridiculous letdown.
In the last 4 slots or just in the last 6 if it’s last 4 I’d get a refund box was tampered with
@@FiereZero my last slot was a foil full art panharmonicon but the majority of my special art treatments were bounce lands i think i got three.
@@ethangarvey674 I work at an lgs and I hope this will make you feel better in some way. I opened 2 collector boxes and 1 loose packs and I was pretty pleased because I was able to cater to the law of large number more so then you. I didn't get a single imperial seal but I literally saw 4 people pull an imperial seal in their literal first pack, it's all numbers in a world where the more money you have to the less disappointment is afforded to you.
@@Dragoon92 i get that. It's more so to the prof's point that they put so much bulk in the set that it doesn't lower the price of those big expensive cards because they're already so rare in the packs. I'd have been happy with 2-3 valuable reprints even if they were only $5-$10 each but i just got junk I'll never play with instead
You could have spent 300 dollars on singles youvreally wanted. The fault is yours
I just don’t have hundreds to thousands of dollars to throw around. So these are unaffordable to me. The next set will also probably be unaffordable. Seems like Wizards is excluding people who play magic that aren’t rich. I appreciate the professor being vocal about these things
For the paywall issue, I've basically quit MTG over it. I still have some of my decks, though I've sold a couple as well, but I haven't bought any new cards or packs in over 9 months, and I don't think I will in the future, unless something changes. I guess I was kind of holding out hope that something would change, but if anything it feels like it's just gotten worse over time.
i still draft the standard sets with friends. But yeah, i don't do that kind of sets and when i miss a cards for my commanders, my printer go brrrr (or the chineses go brrr if i need a "almost real" to play at the stores)
But what you have to realize is that we don't ever need to buy into another set...ever. There are more than enough cards on the market RIGHT NOW to build decks in perpetuity. It's FOMO that keeps us coming back.
@@NeverDauntedRadioNetwork true, but power levels change with each set. And drafting is still a fun experience.
It's been the same for years. I've been in the same boat for a long, long time now.
It's just not worth it.
If anything a reprint set should be cheaper than a standard set. Or a horizons set. Double or more the price is insane.
I absolutely despise the trend of expected value on boxes being overwhelmingly tied up in a handful of chase rares and mythics. I wish WotC would increase the *median* card value by including a healthy number of rares/mythics that are at or near the price of a pack. A distribution of 25/50/25 for low/medium/high value rare slot cards would be a dream. It's not too much to ask; we know they look at these numbers when selecting what goes into reprint sets.
This is a set where you can make your money back on a box, but half of that comes from the last five packs. It's very feast or famine, which rewards those who have the resources to take advantage of the average value over large volume.
That median range is absolutely impossible. That range has 75% of all packs being worth as much or more as the value of the pack. The median value would plummet instantly causing a massive crash in prices immediately and then your median wouldn't be where you wanted it. Also if your top 25% is worth more than 2x the price of a single pack than your average value skews massively high, and that 2x number was assuming your bottom 25% was all worth literally nothing. You'd have issues with all the product being scooped up and sat on due to it's insanely high value if it were a limited print run. If it were an unlimited print run it would tank the price of every single card in it.
A 25/50/25 distribution would just crash the price of all singles into the ground. If that's what you want then sure but it's not realistic. You can't have a ratio that has 75% of packs worth as much or more than the value of the pack.
@@Justiceinall You are absolutely correct - I was simply throwing a completely made-up and unrealistic number out there to illustrate my point. The fact of the matter is that the overall distribution of value should be much more smooth to avoid what we saw in this latest disappointing set :(
The funny part about this is how WotC spends time and resources to produce, randomize and pack all those mostly worthless cards, and then most of the product gets unceremoniously ripped open, sorted, and probably a large part of it simply dumped into the trash. Just to get at the few cards hat hold a bit of value. The lunacy of the world...
Do me a favor? Watch yesterday's video on "The Problem Players Of Commander" if you missed it: ruclips.net/video/ZLP-bbdlvZI/видео.html
WotC removing MSRP gives them the opportunity to say "we don't base prices on secondary market value, it's the people buying and selling at that price" while still charging distributors more for premium sets because they both know people will buy it.
I will watch it again lol. I have kids so half the stuff I watch anywhere is hard to watch the full way through.
I'm really glad Flesh and Blood when they got rid of first edition, made Cold Foils appear in the token slot. So you basically just don't grab the cold foil card and sabotage your own draft: if you open your draft pack with a special card in the token slot you can keep it.
Flesh and Blood does pull rates and pricing right (after the first couple sets anyway). You can have a lot of fun opening boxes without paying a ton of money. Pokemon used to be good too but has gotten worse over time. MTG is just the worst. I actually like Collector Booster Boxes when they're $180-190, I think they're worth that and a ton of fun, but when they're $300+ or only have 4 packs it's just not worth it.
The no MSRP thing is what killed paper MTG for me.
I'm guessing it's working as intended so stores can charge more money without looking bad, but damn does it price out so many people.
@@MegaLadysman1234 Yes, but the M literally stands for MANUFACTURER'S. Which means WOTC would set prices, and typically, most stores would honor it. Don't get hostile unless you know what you're talking about.
@@endersblade WotC does set the price. It's just invisible to the public. Before and after the change, prices for stores didn't change at all. Their cost remained identical on standard product. That means the hidden MSRP can be worked out with simple math for anyone who has the distributor's price for any given product. Remember that the MSRP removal also happened just before WotC started selling directly on Amazon. They knew they couldn't compete with the market at the original MSRP of 145/box, so they erased the MSRP so they could sell just a couple of bucks above what they charge distributors and stores.
@@MegaLadysman1234 They're too new to have experienced From the Vault, Commander 2013, and the first Modern Masters. They can't know that MSRP doesn't help anything.
I have not watched this channel for a long time (my mtg interest comes and goes in periods), but last time I watched there had just been a flood in the basement and the future of the channel was unclear. I am glad to see that the channel is still here, and that it is going strong! Kudos to you for staying true to who you are and for excellent content. I watch your videos - even though I (mostly) am not an mtg player. That goes a long way to show how good and entertaining your videos are!
I just realized a few days ago how double masters has shifted my view toward the price of regular packs
Now i feel more compelled to get them under 5$ because “atleast they aren’t 15$”
But i think that was their whole game
Door in the face/ foot in the door psychology
Scare you off with a big price and then entice you with a lower one thinking you are getting a better deal
They want expensive to be normalized because they know they can sell
Something that I've said to the owner of my Local Game Store is: "The day WotC makes a pro LGS decision is the day I will be surprised"
When they fail to reprint anything useful into standard sets and each plane is only visited for a single set it's no wonder standard is dead
Commander is the new way-to-play, come on over and forget about that standard crap:)
@@JMarcus52 yeah but standard is a fun way to play. I actually think Commander gets worse the more people play only it and no Standard/Pioneer/Modern.
I opened 2 collector's boosters from this set. The second contained Borderless Teferi's Protection, and a foil borderless Teferi's Protection. And thought to myself, "In any other set, this would be an amazing pull. Here, it was $80 wasted." I knew I wouldn't be opening a lot of this product, but I expected the excitement to last longer than 2 Collector Boosters.
I took the time to fill out WotC’s Double Masters 2022 survey to tell them how much I liked the content of the set. And that I’m a draft and commander player who didn’t and won’t spent a dollar on this set because of the price. Recommend everyone do the same.
I had filled it out saying I would have bought it if my LGS had not sold out on preorder, with confused messages on a second wave
It now closed
Wehre can i find the survey?
Your comment at 18:06 really is concise and on the nose. Has anyone else noticed that there aren't a ton of high-value cards in Standard sets anymore and some of the most sought after cards are sprinkled into $50+ Commander Pre-Cons, then later put into Master's Sets? The business model is there and they know which cards will be sought after (well, most of the time). They know Commander is basically keeping paper Magic alive at this point, so they put the good stuff in the highest price products.
Definitely agree with the draft argument. I don't quite get what low powered draft chaff is doing in a set that's supposed to be higher powered and whose slots could be taken up by something with a bit more value.
i.e. if Last Breath was replaced by Swords to Plowshares, would that really kill the experience? What is Skeleton Archer doing there? Remove the rares and it's just... M22.
The removal suite for all of the colors in XM2 is very balanced. Average cost to remove a creature is 3. If they printed StP as an uncommon, it would basically completely warp the format around it. Since at least one or two people in a pod are bound to get it, possibly 3-4+. Would completely nullify basically all other removal
It IS a high powered draft set, that's true, but the power mostly comes from late game bombs or really fast early game aggro, both of which StP is good for. And being able to draft 3 color decks means almost everyone that sees it will have access to it
In my opinion
Perhaps. It does have really good removal. Though, I wasn't suggesting replacing that one card alone.
My bigger point was how much it felt like a templated base set with bigger bombs. For such an absurd and self contained (reprint) set, it feels like a missed opportunity to not have a bunch more format warping cards in it.
I completely agree. For such a high powered set, it felt very slow. In all honesty it feels a lot like commander lite, like pitting 2 pre-cons against one another.
Remand is another great example, they could have used that instead of mana leak, but opted not to.
Sad to say, and I think we can both agree on this, is that the only real reason they didn't up the power level on this $400 per box set is because of corporate greed
I was once told by a great professor to buy singles. I was happy we got some reprints, some of them got more affordable, after years I was finally able to get my hands on a Sensei's top. I still do hate the fact that I cannot enjoy playing a good draft or buy a box if I want to simply because these price tags are not realistic.
I spent way too much on Double Masters 2022 and it is inevitably going to affect my engagement in the rest of the sets releasing this year. I doubt I will buy more than a handful of cards and packs for the rest of the year. Normally, I would love to get boxes, bundles, and commander decks but instead I'll be watching from the sidelines because I'm basically tapped out.
I haven’t bought anything of anything since the start of predator behavior in the beginning of the pandemic 😷
You, sir, are 100% on the money correct. Thank you for voicing it.
This could be as simple as just having two separate products like how the collectors editions Warhammer Precons will be. Redesign the collector edition packs to actually be limited printing alternative/borderless art cards where that is the only place to get them. The normal set and draft packs can be more easily accessible for staples.
You can then have a functioning collectors market and a functional fun game.
Such an important topic!
Regular boosters are at $4, make the premium, masters sets twice the price of the normal product, then make collector boosters 3x the price of normal boosters. I guarantee sales would climb so much that they make more money than selling the current, lower quantities at the stupidly high prices.
Also, create an arbitrary classification for rates and mythics like “high in-game demand” versus low and guarantee that premium products contain at least one high demand rare/mythic is in one of the two rare slots. That way wizards can avoid acknowledging the secondary market values while ensuring that premium boosters are worth their price tag without having to buy an entire box and gamble to break even over time. I love mtg but like you said, it has to change bc burnout is soon to come. I already know players who are exiting the game due to wallet fatigue and it’s sad. Thanks Professor and God bless!
Around the end of last year, I made a list of which Magic: The Gathering products I wanted to buy and the results are actually really surprising. One of the products on my list was DOUBLE MASTERS 2022, and yet I have not bought a single pack of it since it released. Gee, I wonder why that is... 🤔 Maybe because my local game store doesn't sell it because even they realize it's too expensive to carry. Or maybe it's because from my perspective, DOUBLE MASTERS 2022 doesn't seem worth it? So yeah, my local game store doesn't have DOUBLE MASTERS 2022. You know who in my town has DOUBLE MASTERS 2022? Yep, you guessed it, Walmart. So far I've resisted the temptation, but I don't know how much longer I can go without giving in. Individual packs of DOUBLE MASTERS 2022 are selling for about $22 CAD. That's a bit steep, isn't it?
So price gouging aside, why else haven't I bought any DOUBLE MASTERS 2022? It's because...there's not really a lot of cards in the set to justify me wanting to buy any amount of it. The common slot looks particularly underwhelming. Kasmina's Transmutation? Own it. Doomed Traveler? How many copies of this do I have again? My point is, a lot of these cards are from more recent years, like 2016-now recent. You know which card Wizards SHOULD have put in this set? Steelshaper's Gift. That card is REALLY expensive! Especially if you get the foil version. And they could've upshifted it to RARE! But yeah, Wizards of the Coast just does what they want to do, while ignoring us. Because to them, we sound like a bunch of crying babies, and nobody likes to hear a baby cry.
You asked the question, “…at which point do players stop buying boxes?”, I found my point. I loved ripping boxes, for the past two or three years I’ve been back in this hobby heavily, just ripping away. COVID got you down, rip a box. Too late to grab a box from the LGS, run to Walmart and target and grab up a few collector’s boosters. Cleaned out a few bonuses on magic product. Didn’t help that I had the dark ones own luck, pulled some crazy good stuff. Then around Modern Horizons 2, it all started smacking me back a bit; not so many great pulls, and money was getting tied up in other things. I knew when Double Master 2022 was announced, that I wasn’t gonna be buying any of it. I’ve
Been slowly buying a couple random singles here and there with store credit I get from trade ins. Happier than I have ever been with the hobby. Just wanna thank the Cassius Marsh’s of the world. Somebody’s gotta rip these packs, and it ain’t gonna be me.
Here's my take: In every set you can see the dichotomy between the 'value' team and the 'draft experience' team, both of which play a major role in establishing both initial--and long term-- excitement/demand for their given set. In this set in particular, the line between the two is more blatant than ever, which could possibly be a result of any number of issues (not excluding too many sets released in too short a time with not enough staff). If the draft wasn't a factor here, the top down, value focussed approach might have been able to shine a little brighter (esp. at this price point). If the value wasn't a factor, the draft aspect may have created a more 'bottom up' developmental environment in which value could have been crafted more organically. As it is, I don't think WOTC had enough time to consider the latter, and likely pulled cards from other sets (Sensei's Top, Mana Vault and Dockside from NEO, SNC, and CLB respectively) to match a predetermined, corporate-established price point. I refuse to believe that the art pieces on the cards mentioned were not commissioned for those newer sets as they are the only random homages to their sets' respective art-style. Also, if I want to take off my small tinfoil hat to put on my even larger tinfoil hat, I'd say somebody at WOTC is sending us a (perhaps penitent) subliminal message on the Dockside flavor text which reads, "It's just business". And this, folks, is why I went to college to get a BA in philosophy. 🤣🤣🤣
Mana Vault will never be in Standard
@@PhoenixRNH 1. It doesn't actually have to be in standard for it to be in standard packs 2. Who actually knows what WOTC is willing to do at this point with their game to sell packs?
I just want to compliment Prof's sick tie.
"Made for Draft" is the new Wizards code for "We don't intend to reprint much-needed reprints in any effective way."
Screw draft. For once, just print the damn cards for the sole purpose of selling them to those who need them.
But that's what secret lairs are for! /j
“Because it’s all working as intended.” Keep being vocal prof.
I was really excited for double masters, had a group that wanted to do some draft nights maybe get some of those many touted reprints for commander and enjoy a draft experience with some high power level cards. However, upon seeing the price, we all dipped out, $60 for a draft is really expensive, and we’d all rather just buy singles at that point. It’s really disappointing seeing these cards that are needed still maintain a high price tag. At least we still have tabletop sim to play commander, as paper commander is becoming increasingly harder to play and much more expensive.
Great video, thanks prof for being the voice of a good part of the community.
I realised that I went from buying a booster box in NEO to only 5 packs in 2X2. Hit a consecrated sphinx & wrenn and decided to “end it on a high”. (Went on to pull the daylights out if these 2 cards from Hewlett Packard Masters)
Dropped by my LGS recently and a bunch of dudes were cracking 2X2 at the counter. Their groans and moans at each dud rare/mythic reminded me to stay clear of the lotto packs.
Left with a bunch of SNC singles instead.
The sad part to me is seeing people still buy into this product despite all of the glaring issues. I’ve seen some people even walk away with TWO draft boxes just because they could. If we don’t start holding ourselves to a higher standard then WoTC will just continue to set the bar lower and lower for us.
@@MegaLadysman1234 People getting them for the preorder price is fine, and I’m sorry for not clarifying earlier. I’m talking about seeing people buy boxes despite knowing that the prices have been jacked up way too high. And while yes, LGSs purposefully charging more is part of the problem, WoTC is also to blame for getting rid of MSRPs that help regulate that sort of practice. It’s part of the reason I put some amount of responsibility on the consumer- they know they can charge more if people will buy it. They’re only going to keep pushing the envelope if people continue to buy these products at ridiculous prices.
@@MegaLadysman1234 Why would crashing MtG's secondary market be a legal nightmare for WotC? What cases could be brought against them, on what legal grounds?
@@MegaLadysman1234 So the reason WotC could be sued for demolishing the secondary market is because they have a legal responsibility to shareholders. That makes sense.
I'm not convinced that keeping the secondary market's prices up is their best strategy for making profits, so I cannot confidently agree with the claim that them not doing so would get them in legal trouble (unless a company foregoing some short-term profits for stability is grounds for legal accusations), but I understand the logic behind the claim now. And yeah, the exact claim you're making is correct; they'd certainly get in trouble if they deliberately and completely crashed that market.
@@MegaLadysman1234 I feel the need to point out a few things here.
First, it is my understanding that company/division leaders are hired not to guarantee long-term profits, but to make a certain amount of profit in the short term. It's not uncommon for those people to move on from their leadership roles in well under a decade; they have no investment in the long-term health of the company, and it is not their job to have one. It is their job to guarantee profits now. Is that correct? If not, ignore the rest of this first paragraph.
It is their job to make as much money as possible over the next few years, therefore they will hire finance/strategy/growth/etc. experts (henceforth called "experts") to help them with their task. Those experts, having been given the job of securing as much profit as quickly as possible, will do so, and will do their jobs well.
I hold that, the strategy (executed over the next 3 years) which makes a company as much profit as possible over the next 3 years is different than the strategy (executed over the next 3 years) which makes that company as much profit as possible over the next 30 years. I hold that this is true for all similar timeframes (informal, but shouldn't be difficult to understand). Now, given this, I do trust those experts. I think they are better at their jobs than I am - I would be deeply disappointed if they aren't! Therefore, I expect that they will find a very good strategy to match their goals. This will be a strategy which maximizes profit over the next few years, for the reason stated at the start of this paragraph. This strategy, therefore, will not be the strategy which maximizes profit in the long term, which is what I was talking about in my previous reply.
Appeals to authority are bad form. That said, I agree with the principle of your comment, and am willing to overlook the fact that it's fallacious. The fallacy doesn't matter; your point is flawed even if appeals to authority are considered sound arguments. My belief that Wizard's current strategy is not the optimal one for long-term success comes from the fact that I believe their experts are good at their jobs!
Second, when did I claim I knew more than those experts? When did I imply that I believed such a thing? Those were quite the assumptions for you to make. Reread my claim! I did neither of those things!
"I am *not convinced* that … is their *best* strategy..." (emphasis mine). Bolded words are important: "Best" is extreme. It is very unlikely that WotC's current strategy is the _best_ one they could be using. Everyone, including experts, can improve at what they do, and there are essentially infinite strategies they could use. That said, I did include a large set of strategies (all the strategies which involve maintaining the secondary market), so while there are a staggering number of possible strategies, I did make a claim about a significant fraction of them.
That's why I said I 'wasn't convinced,' instead of acting confident. "Not convinced" implies that I can be convinced. I am *not convinced* that the claim is true, but I am also not sure the claim is false.
Ultimately, this isn't that important. I'd just prefer for you not to misrepresent me. That said, I understand why you read my reply in the way that you did; just, please be a bit more careful in the future. (I won't claim I never make mistakes like this, I certainly do sometimes)
Third and finally, "the major issues of risk aversion" are a very bad point to bring up in this conversation, at least on your side of the argument. Remember, over the last few years, Wizards have been changing their business practices significantly. They have demonstrated that they are fine with risk, and, if they are doing well right now, they are doing well _because_ they have been taking risks. If Wizards shouldn't take risks, they should go back to acting as they did before recently, because that has been working well for them for decades, where these new methods are relatively untested. Let me repeat that: If being averse to taking risks is good for a company, than Wizards should not continue down the path they're currently on.
Even with the point benefiting 'my side,' I take issue with the idea that companies and people should be adverse to risk in the first place - individual risks should be taken or not on the basis of risk/reward. That is, a risk should be taken if it advances the relevant set of goals in a mathematical sense,* and it should not be taken if it does not (in practice, while it would be ideal to use math for this analysis, that will often be impractical. This mathematically pure concept is the ideal, but isn't necessarily achievable; it's the thing that people should follow as best as they can). Because I don't think the point is correct, I will not use it myself.
*where "the relevant set of goals" are set up such that e.g. going bankrupt is weighted as far more bad than losing the amount of money required to go bankrupt. That is, these are not naïve "make the most money possible" style goals that can lead to nonsense like a company taking a 99% chance to go bankrupt for the sake of a 1% chance to earn 10 trillion dollars (adjust the numbers until this example makes sense, perhaps $10 trillion is worth that kind of risk for some companies), they are goals that let the math speak the truth.
Draft buy singles try not to fret! I did my best work of brushing off all fomo. I am very happy with my self control and was handsomely rewarded for it. As I got every card I wanted in the 4 drafts I played and then I purchased 1 borderless imp seal for way less than tcg market on release day. Drafted well and was able to trade the valuable cards I didn’t need for a dual land I def. needed. Extremely satisfied with myself for not succumbing to the fomo on this double the price masters set! Great post btw
I love this game. However this business practice is horrendous. Feels really really bad.
In my experience with the set so far is that it has a lot of good reprints but also a lot of duds because of the “double” which is just a gimmick to give you a lot crap rares
This situation with double masters has really turned me off on Magic and has me considering selling my collection and just getting out. I love the cards and game but Wizards is just making it such a toxic buyer experience. I feel this way and I even have an amazing LGS that sells packs/boxes cheaper than everywhere else.
If i was actually playing id literally just buy pre cons, or make decks. all this other shit is a literal scam
What is a LGS? I am new to Magic.
@@MichaelSuperbacker local game store
And like the Prof says, MTG is more popular than ever. Which means all their shitty cashgrabs and greed ramping up over the last few years has only been rewarded, so they will just keep doing it. I wouldn't recommend MTG to anyone these days. There is SO MUCH better entertainment value out there for your money. So many video games, card games, board games, etc that have so much love, creativity, and are a tiny fraction of the cost of a single MTG deck.
I'm getting into NISEI Netrunner now to fill the gamblomancy hole MtG has left in my heart.
My buddy and I both bought a draft box each to actually draft with friends this coming weekend. I'll be honest though, it was hard to convince our friends to draft it with us though at this price point...
My answer has been to escape to Penny Dreadful EDH. Can't get gouged on price if you refuse to play with expensive cards. The community is tiny, but I've been loving it. Feels so great to say, "How about I brew 5 new decks this week" and have each cost less than $2.
For low budget players like me, it has been hard for me to grab a box.
The good thing is that singles prices are dropping. But not by much. I can't afford the box or a pack. Sadly this set is something I would love to get a box of- but I am priced out of the game.
I swore you off, but like an addiction I checked you out again. This was a very well done video. Thoughtful, well reasoned, Important critique. Well written. Interesting. Great examples. Excellent points regarding the draft experience (seal comment). You won me back. I subscribed again.
You are right. It is ripping off people. That's why I decided - after many years of buying MTG products - to end it. No more boxes, packs nor singles. If prices should return to an acceptable level I rejoin. But, I decided to not purchase any WtoC products for 1 year, regardless of price. It should teach them some lesson, if enough people would join me.
Coolest and most exciting alternate arts is right my sister did the art descriptions for the artists for all the borderless cards. I’m really proud. Unfortunately she doesn’t work at wizards anymore, for frustrating reasons I’m not privy to talk about. But I am so proud of her for bearscape and these full arts as well as cool things like the fish tokens in new capena.
I would love to see MSRP brought back. I look at the premium sets from last year Time Spiral and Modern Horizons 2 had great reprints and the price per pack was like under $7 for TS and about $10 for MH2. So why does this set cost so much
Because they scattered it with a predominance of chase cards at mythic instead of spreading them out to other sets- and then also stuffed the set full of bulky stuff.
So the EV of the box goes up when you have 70-150$ hits, but the value of an individual pack can be something like 50 cents. Basically the variance in value is huge.
@@billdoetsch MH2 and time spiral both had high end chase cards. Yes wizards is good at putting bulk mythics and rares in sets.
you want MSRP back, write or call your local state representative. Demand MSRP to be required of items sold in the US like it is in most other countries.
I bought two boxes (first time ever i decided to buy a box) and i must say that i have opened a bunch of commander staples, but i totally agree with you with all what you mentioned and i will never buy a box again. Without a big luck, you are not able to get your money back in value of the cards, not even close to it. The odds are better if you buy solo boosters from at best 2 or 3 other shops to prevent getting boosters from the same box. Only like 8-10 booster out of each box had some kind of value (counting 5 dollars +). In the future i will wait 2-3 weeks after release of the new set and buy only the staples i want from it. Will spare me time and money indeed with a kind of guarantee payback in value of the cards i bought. This leads to stop purchasing their products and i am pretty sure that i am not the only one who thinks the same way. GJ HASBRO, you got your money, i am proud of you.
I bought like 8 packs
I felt so stinged
I get that that is always there, getting bad rares in a pack
But in a 16-17 dollar pack, that makes you feel like you dont want to buy any of the set
Also the prices on the reprints I personally wanted, they didnt even go down very much!
In 2009-2011 I organized tournaments in my area within the WPN. I taught how to play to everyone who wanted to know and, when I understood that a product couldn't be affordable for many, I try to buy it myself to give the possibility to play with it: this way I organized Planechase and Archenemy tournaments.
After 2011 I need to stop to organize due to university studies. But I enjoyed tournaments as a player when I can... Until 2013.
Then, the prices of all products start to skyrocket. If someone asked me to teach him or her to play, I calmly refused putting a lot of disclaimers about prices and so on. But sometimes I taught the same.
From 2014 to 2019 I played mainly at home with friends, sometimes going to a LGS's tournament. But I was excited when a new product came out and I always look at the spoilers to see if something could be interesting to me.
Then came the pandemic. And the overflow of Magic products.
Since 2020's Mystery Booster I hardly had the patience to look at spoilers or to be informed on what's new, what products are now on the shelves and what will be there soon. I simply cannot memorize them, they're to much. And they are always to high in prices so I lost interest.
In the last 2 years I basically bought only some random standard booster drafts packs 3-6 at a time when I see them in a physical store, if I have enough extra money after the main life expenses.
The friends who play at home with me until 2019... Simply don't play Magic anymore: the costs send them to other games, independently of other their life choices and needs.
I've been preaching that WotC has been grooming players to pay more ever since the very first Masters set came out years ago with a premium price. I still refuse to buy them and get frustrated when other people do because it was obvious where this road was heading. These premium prices are insanely hypocritical, allowing WotC to have all of the benefits of the secondary market while simultaneously refusing to acknowledge it, which screws over the consumer. There is a reason the laws WotC keeps skirting exist.
Which laws are you referring to? I am very curious about this.
@@jeremymajors8982Gambling laws. The second WotC acknowledges some cards are worth more than others, booster packs become lottery tickets and all the baggage that comes with gambling regulations follow. For years WotC has very carefully avoided referring to the prices of the secondary market, while also milking it as hard as possible.
Regarding the price of draft, on MTGO you can pay $10 for an initial entry fee for double masters 2022 phantom draft (you dont keep the cards), but if you win at least 2 out of 3 matches, you get enough play points to pay for another entry fee, so you can go infinite. I highly recommend doing this because this set is super fun to draft.
My friend bought a collector box of double masters. He was *so excited* he thought he was going to pull so much value and great cards. He got a full art Imperial Seal and everything else were bulk rares. He was DEVASTATED. He spent hundreds of dollars on this box and he was burned, badly, by it.
Buying sealed product is always a gamble, but that gambling is fun at $4 a pack. At these prices it's just predatory.
@@EliyaSelhub 100% correct. Predatory gambling.
I felt excited and thrilled about double masters and that this would be the set you would say was worth the money to get, but taking into consideration all that is in this video and having opened almost every dud rare in a booster box, I can now see clearly what the problem is and how wizards are playing us. I am glad that we got a reprint set after so long of holding off, but the biggest thing I can see being nonsensical is that they refuse to reprint actually needed cards into other sets and now I understand why. This channel is the best and I am glad to have your advice and understand to help me use my money the best I can, from all the way back in magic origins times when I got the pre-made decks that actually had chase standard cards like Siege Rhino and Windswept Heath. Hope you keep going strong and we see the day that money stops being a driving factor behind big company decisions.
"I don't want all cards to be worthless."
I do. Accessibility is paramount. If there exists a single card without at least one printing you can get for a few bucks at most, then you have failed to print enough.
Let the special shiny variants be the absurdly expensive chase pieces. But let there be a reasonably priced base model as an option for someone that doesn't care that it looks boring because it plays just the same.
I dont entirely agree, BUT I do staunchly believe all lands should be worthless. I don't mind spending big bucks on a cool combo piece, card advantage engine, or big bomb, but it feels sooooo shitty to spend $$ just to be able to cast your spells
Good thing your not in charge running a Collectable card game company. Think you wanna play munchkin or something.
@@jkattack2640 yeah, why is one of the most expensive part of so many decks the part that's the least interesting?
I love this idea, but this does have outliers. I come from a yu-gi-oh background and even after almost 15 reprints a card called Ash-Blossom's lowest rarity print, a common from a structure deck is still over 20 dollars. if a card is good and popular the price even at a lower rarity will still hold a pretty penny. With how MTG is constructed i don't know if reprinting the hell out of some power piece cards will affect their value. Outside of banning cards and removing them from formats to purposely tank their value i don't know what they can do.
Was gifted a booster box from my spouse. Pulled an Imperial Seal borderless, and a regular Wrenn and Six, among a few other good cards but all together, it wasn't worth the cost of the box. Not with the collector-booster-only foil-etched or textured being the BIS. There is no winning with the cost of these. But they are priceless to me because they were a gift from someone who knew I wanted these but couldn't feasibility pay the cost.
I just got back into Magic after playing as a teenager and there is no way I'm touching this set, I need to build a collection (thanks for all the advice, notably on Commander Precons) so price is obviously a factor.
I feel like I would only buy this set if I wanted to gamble, not play the game.
Yup, I bought one pack for the "fix". According to the internet I got a $40 Force of Negation. Trade it for two packs?
I preordered a box before spoilers for $240 and I haven't opened it yet. I used to love opening packs and this set seemed like it might be really fun, but your first point has me thinking that i may be better off flipping this thing sealed for a profit and just buying singles.
Oh yes, just take the investment and Get the singles...
I was blown away when the leaks for double masters started. But being a think first person, I refrained from locking in a couple of boxes before release. I was suspicious that the set would be filled with a ton of irrelevant cards ( lord of extinction) and made the conscious choice of just picking the singles that I wanted. Some of those are just cards from my favourite artist, Richard Kane Ferguson.
And I do believe that this set was and is a mistake. They cannabilized the other products and for the players, the experience of draft ain't good, far from it.
I seriously miss and reminisce on the days where I was new to the world of magic. War of the Spark had cool cards, fun story my new naive mind captivated by this new exciting venture. Getting the courage to go to my local game stop to play in FNM, I didnt realise many people would be there (I didnt know how popular it was). I thought my standard deck was pretty good, and, well it wasn't as good as I thought, but going away, I would crack some packs for fun and discover new cards to put in my deck and slowly upgrade it, refining it with each standard set. That was the most enjoyable part for me. I was incredibly excited for the Throne of Eldraine pre-release event, and I loved it! Now, I feel none of that. Its become a barren monochromatic landscape where only the wealthy can afford anything relevent. I recall the starter kits, and standard pre-cons (plansewalker decks etc) where they were perfect for newer players and were decent price. Its so clear that wizards lately are becoming more greedy by throwing out a new set each week, trampling over the last to get the 5 seconds of fame before being overshadowed by the next. This is ruining the fun, while overstimulating and confusing players and shattering any care or attention anyone would give to the rich settings and lore wizards created for that set. Furthermore, I feel now more than ever is the perfect time to consider what wizards are doing for staples that are expensive on the secondary market. Now more than ever I feel it is evident that wizards DO acknowledge the secondary market. That conversation needs to be had again.
Id love to have a "reprint" set at 3.99 booster packs intended to be drafted. That would be fun. I'd also love a reprint set with cards that need to be printed like fetchlands in 3.99 per pack.
I dont understand why wotc (and many, many other entertainment product companies) choose to keep increasing prices, rush out more products, and skimp on quality just to make a quick buck in the short term when they first made their money and gained popularity by doing the exact opposite.
Because ppl with money will always buy it. So they lose fan base,but not money,hence price hikes. Which makes all cards more expensive and coveted.
Really eloquent and well thought out, prof! Also, it doesn't go unnoticed that your production values, lighting, cameras etc keep on getting better. We appreciate you!
I'm sad to say that I really didn't care about Double Masters. I wasn't going to pay a premium to draft it (though that looks fun), and it was obvious pretty early on that none of the reprints will affect price. It's so easy to get me excited about TCGs and Wizards are failing to do so again and again, and I see the same thing in other people. That said, let's look forward to the coming 4-set story arch and hope it makes me feel something. Anything.
People gave me flack for wanting nothing to do with this set and you know I’m happier without it. $330 can get you a good start in Warhammer.
😂😂😂 Great post! Very funny!
The next Fast & Furious movie will be them robbing trucks for MTG cards.
I've played and collected Magic since 1995. I pride myself on my enormous collection 50K plus starting with Revised (Sure wish I collected before Revised). I goal was to collect sets. Over the last three years its become to damn expensive to collect anymore. I have this foreboding fear that Wotc's insatiable greed will destroy this game and my collection will be worthless in the future.
To give you an idea how bad the allocations were in Europe- I work at a LGS, we are a sanctioned store and ran tournaments since Amonkhet. We ordered a few Double Masters 2022, not high numbers, but we got
-3 Booster Boxes
-1 Collectors Box
That's it. 2 from one distributor, 1+1 from another. And they are the BIG distributors that usually have no problem with the number of MTG products. So yeah, I feel hurt in this one.
And the number of people who appeared at a draft event- one. It was sad.
Ive been a magic whale for as far as I can remember and even to me this set was the drop that broke the camel's back. Me and my friends are proxing the high cost rares going forward, we are tired of waiting for decent prices reprints so we can buy them (and we all own docksides we just want more) so we are now selling our copies and we are keeping one copy of each we can "own" and copy proxies for all our decks. We are done buying sealed product as wizards grow increasingly greedy, we avoided this set and will avoid all sets going forward. We are excited about Warhammer 40k decks though and we are buying the product but we are proxing the upgrades and making the proxies Warhammer lore friendly
Out of interest, If WotC reprinted dockside as a common and it dropped to $1 a card would you be happy that can you can buy more for every deck or pissed because you just lost $70? :)
@@mangoman9290 much prefer for it to drop to 1, I don't buy cards to hold value, I buy to play (and art)
@@pops91 Awesome, so after you proxy the cards are you are going to sell the extras for $1 each? If the value of your cards isnt a concern why not show it, put your words into direct action!
@@mangoman9290 I would sell them to price, if dockside would drop to 1 I would buy more than 1 since they would be cheaper than proxies, if the are 70 I would sell all but 1 copy at price.
Your first point is spot on!! Since the inception of Masters I've been screaming at the heavens that draft should be zero priority in a master set. Set pictures are perfect double Masters never should have had draft packs not one
It's sad knowing cards are getting more and more expensive and out of reach for many people☹️
Watching this video actually hurt, because of how accurate it is. I love magic. I have played on and off for years, across various formats. Each stint of playing, something happens where I get disillusioned and end up selling all my cards and calling a time out. When I get back into it, I get excited over the discovery of new cards, only to play another few years to eventually become apathetic again. I have always had jobs that have adequately supported my interest in magic, but even still, the time inevitably came where I felt I wasn't getting my value for money, or simply felt empty. I got back into magic last year, and already through 2022, I feel apathy creeping back in. Very poor decisions have been made and the significant level of responsibility that should be owned and addressed by WOTC is just being ignored and unaddressed by them. If I have been correctly informed, the EDH/Commander format was created by Magic players, which again if I have been informed correctly, was the format that saved MtG. That being the case, evidently WOTC hasn't learned a damn thing about success coming from listening to what their players want...which in the end, as Prof has stated, is self-sabotage and will spell their demise. It may not happen today or tomorrow, but if things persist this way, I'm not seeing a lot of hope. Keep at it Prof. Integrity is a thing of short supply these days, and buckets of it you possess needs to be spread around.
I bought one pack of double masters, got two rares that didnt add up to £1 and 4 duplicates
Yeah and even the cards themselves just are not even that playable
You nailed it on the head when you say "needed reprints are still needed reprints even after being reprinted in Double Masters" (not exact quote).
The set is barely out that we already need a new reprint for Dockside Extortionist, Cavern of Souls, Force of Negation, Wren and Six, etc. The reprinting has had a negligible impact on most chase cards.
Honestly I’m really just sad about Double Masters. I’ve been looking forward to getting into commander and getting the more chase cards for a while now and seeing these cards get reprinted with new amazing art is so cool but I haven’t bought a single pack or single since the set has come out. Most cards that I want have barely gone down at all and drafting the set is just way out of my price range. It really feels like Wizards doesn’t give a shit about making the game accessible to young people who are trying to build out there collection and decks more to actually play but instead only care about big whales who are gonna buy whatever set comes out anyways. The game has become so popular they could make anything and rake in tons of money they don’t need players like me anymore so what’s even the point of building new decks anymore I can just play with the cards I have casually I guess.
I just buy my pre cons and play, all the other shit isnt for peasants like us
Well said Prof. Among my crew, we used to buy packs, boxes, and commander decks. Now, we all just cherry pick cards from TCG orders or trade at the LGS. As long as we aren’t chasing full-art foils, even most ‘good’ cards of the regular prints aren’t overly expensive 1 to 4 weeks after release. That is what we consider the prime window.
Hands down, we all now spend less on cards because individual good cards are generally cheaper for regular prints while the sealed stuff is pricier. If we want to crack
packs for the endorphin rush, we do a standard set booster draft/pre-release.
When everything is special, nothing is special. Don’t buy into the hype.
Yeah, it looked exciting but I looked at the list of cards in the set and the odds of getting anything valuable, and just decided it's absolutely not worth it. I've joined the game recently at Innistrad Midnight Hunt, started to love the game during Neon Dynasty, but even I can see the terrifying pace of the game. SNC looked like a fun world to collect, but was quickly overtaken by Baldur, which ended up being a low value set followed by DM22, which is weirdly also kinda low value, or at least it is if you go for packs. I feel like by the time I can think about a set, it's gone, undervalued, and replaced.
Always glad to see/hear someone who is not blinded by the goldnuggets. 10 x thumps up!
Prof, I pray that the people at WoTC are listening to you. Your giving them free advice on how to keep the player base alive and coming back and they are just doing the opposite.
VERY excited. Spent $6k USD on 10 box Draft and 10 box Collectors. Opened 3 of each and keeping the rest for resale. I honestly wish resale market for sealed products didn't exist but as long as it does it's smart to buy good sets and keep for a few years.
One thing I'll say in Double Masters' defense, being fortunate enough to draft it, is that picking 2 cards in your first pick per pack allows you to grab that money rare and get the card that actually works for your build.
It's a shame though that such an amazing draft format won't be experienced by so many players, either due to price or limited supply. Props to the designers, not so much to the execs.
"Draft be damned"
Lord have mercy, I've been saying that for decades.
Initially, when I first heard that Double Masters was returning, as someone who missed the first one, I was thrilled! Unfortunately, buying a box for draft was literally so expensive, it was actually CHEAPER TO BUY THE COLLECTORS than it was to buy the draft! I was flabbergasted and ended up doing the same that Tolarian did and bought 4 collectors, because I play the box game too: if it pays for itself, I’ll buy another one. Unfortunately, out of 16 packs I pulled 8 borderless Coiling Oracles that are worth Bok and only got lucky a couple of times with Mana Vault or Cavern of Souls. There were also 5 borderless Spell Pierce. How many duplicates of cards worth barely anything do I have to get before I get something worth anything? I am rather disappointed with the rares as well, interesting but most that I got were worth less than the cost to even list and sell them so what’s the point? Honestly disappointed in DM 2022.
I drafted Ultimate Masters and Double Masters. The apathy that you mentioned was there on both. I couldn't justify buying a box of Ultimate Masters and now, after your videos, I cannot justify buying a box of Double Masters even though I need/could use most, if not all, of the cards in it. Especially not when I could go buy a set box of both War of The Spark and Zendikar Rising for almost half the price and get better value for my collection.
Perfect points, that's exactly how I feel about magic and that's why I used to like commander before wizards recognized it and took over it