I agree with your points, but I don't really care that much because your points seem a bit obvious.
I was mainly try to encourage you to add a little more meat to your articles in the future. Complaining about Mythics and about how drafts aren't very profitible is a decent starting point for an article, but if that's the entirety of it, it seems a bit shallow.
I've liked reading your past articles as you're very good at writing in an entertaining, lighthearted, and fun manner, and I would like to see more articles like that in the future. However, this article seemed to be less fun and more about complaining.
And 2.5 weeks is a pretty long wait time. I was begining to think I was the only one with articles stuck in limbo for weeks on end.
Play the relic and tap it for red and bolt his 4/1 before he untaps. Zoo could play pump spells, I guess, so the only reason to let them untap first is they could have a larger hasty face you want to bolt instead. This play also incentivizes opponent to drop a guy or two so you can Damnation next turn, charge the relic to set up for a turn 6 ultimatum with red up for bolt.
"While these points are very true, they don't really mean very much to me." So you agree with my points but dont care about them?
" In essence, the point of your article is drafting isn't profitable so I'm quitting."- In essence the point of my article is drafting isnt profitable. I never said I was quitting. I just wont play in modern era drafts. They are a money sink. I'd rather paly constructed (more bang for the buck).
"The least you could have done was talk about the classic drafts. They are still really good if you happen to like rare drafting, and they never had mythics." Youre right I could of talked about classic drafts. And the cards there do hold value. The main reason I did not talk about them is they are off the radar. Unless there is a celebration with nix pax or nix tix. They just dont fire that often. Now the only exception may be Te-TE-TE. I bet that would fire pretty regularly. The average drafter wants to jump into a queue and have it fire in under 5 minutes. Not sit there and wait and wait and wait for it to fire (if it even does fire). The majority of drafters are playing in the current standard series.
And when I wrote this article (2 and half weeks ago submitted) they had not announced the winter celebration.
Just to be less confusing, here is cut and pasted text from the Holiday Celebration Announcement....
Mirage Block Nix Tix and Nix Pax Drafts
START TIME: On demand beginning after the scheduled downtime on December 15 until the downtime on December 22.
Tempest Block Nix Tix and Nix Pax Drafts
START TIME: On demand beginning after the scheduled downtime on December 22 until the downtime on December 29.
Your main points seem to be as follows
1) Drafts are not profitable.
2) Mythic rares make drafts less profitable over the long term.
While these points are very true, they don't really mean very much to me. In essence, the point of your article is drafting isn't profitable so I'm quitting.
The least you could have done was talk about the classic drafts. They are still really good if you happen to like rare drafting, and they never had mythics.
For example, next week after the down-time Tempest block becomes available in both Nix Tix and Nix Pack forms. Now that set is a rare-drafter's dream, with a $5 common (Lotus Petal) and a $35 uncommon (Wasteland) among many other choice not-so-rare-or-mythic money cards.
Mythics are bad IMO. They hurt the average player base, and frustrate new players. They don't seem to make new players aspire to get them, they seem out of reach, and develop a "why bother" attitude in them, or at least this is what I have seen in the paper world. I personally am not shy about spending $ on this game, at all. I knew that from the "digital door" having played paper for years, and years. I will say I own 0 Jace, and with stores buying for 90, if I was to draft one... I would sell it.
I used to wait till after a cards departure from standard to pick up things like Jace, but sadly with the redemption of these sets causing (mythic) cards to keep their value after rotation due to the mythics being sucked from the system, I have resigned to never owning one till a Duel Decks: Big Jace comes out (my guess is 3 weeks before WWK rotates out, seems to be the pattern).
I wrote in an article a while ago, that I would like to see mythic rarity used for chase versions of existing cards (alternate art, zendikar's hidden treasures, timeshifted, etc..) but never again for obvious tournament staples.
As for the WOTC buisness end, they are making money hand over fist at the moment, largely due to mythics. This looks great on a shareholder report, and makes people get raises, however this strategy fails to plan for the future, and with damage to the morale of the overall player base, especially concering beginners, I should expect a 4-5 year period of decline not long in the foreseeable future. All bubbles tend to burst.
The other thought from me actually springboards from a thought from Hammy in one of his articles. They are developing a system to be able to "print and distribute single cards". By creating "unobtainable" cards they nearly guarantee a full sell out of massive quantities of the FTV decks, and cleverly they are only releasing them once the purchase of the existing packs containing these mythics has slowed to nongain. This seems to be about 3-5 weeks before the "hot card" contained in the precon would rotate out. A kind of brilliant strategy actually, but I still feel this fails to help player morale for the bulk of time.
More interesting to me is the backlash from players online to mythics. I can no longer count the number of games I get conceded on, with a foul remark due to the inclusion of one or more mythics in my deck. This is extremely more at this point then those who concede due to my deck's overall value (dual lands, foils, etc..) which I have grown to expect.
I want to be clear. MYTHICS do not overall negatively affect me personally. However, they damage morale in many ways, and make me fear a bit for the longevity of the game. As a stakeholder in the success of this game, and of WOTC/HASBRO in general this frustrates me enormously.
As for drafting. I also have stopped drafting non classic sets, due to all the same reasons as above. it's just not worth it, and leaves me feeling low, even when I do well. I am done with it.
While others are asking price questions...I bought Wargate for $0.10 not long ago and now it's 3.00...has the rise really been so slow it shouldn't have appeared on your charts at some point?
If the situation had been altered, and someone had bought him out of Asceticisms, I don't think he would have minded. I thought one of their overall goals was to actually sell cards. If anything, I attribute this mishap to the owner of the bot, or whoever sets the prices, for not keeping up with the latest trends.
When it was created there was no concept of a stack. There was lifo but even that was tricky to describe. The stack formalized Lifo and made rules about what could or could not be stacked etc as well as introducing some concepts like triggers and events. It will have an upto date oracle wording on it's digital face when it comes online.
Ah having read the full card on the client it makes more sense to me. I never actually used the card when it was in print and had it hit me maybe twice in 16++ years total.
Basically it does a couple things with the wording.
1) It makes you the controller of the spell being cast by the player you targeted.
2) You don't have to cast the spell you pick from their hand but it is the only spell you can cast from their hand.
3) The wording also specifies how you can cast it. (Ie you can only use their lands for mana or mana filtering (you could tap Lake of the Dead to sac a swamp for bbbb for instance.) But you can only do this to pay for the spell.
It is a little convoluted still (because of the you control that player phrasing. But Otherwise it is pretty clear.
For example if I have a fireball in hand 3 swamps a lake of the dead and a mountain in play when you cast the word, you can have me cast the fireball at myself (or my creatures or whatever) for x where x is anything from 0 to 7. Any effects that consider the controller count you as the controller of the fireball.
"I need to wrap up here. I'm distracted. I drove 200 miles to run a paper tournament, and I got caught in a blizzard. The stores and malls closed, and the tournament is cancelled. Now I have to get home. I can see traffic from the hotel room - semis look to be moving about 10 mph - and this is in town. It is going to be a long drive. "
i dont understand word of command. "You control that player until Word of Command finishes resolving" does not make sense at all. How do you execute controlling the player part if te spell is not resolved yet (aka on the stack)?why would they choose such a poor wording?
I agree with your points, but I don't really care that much because your points seem a bit obvious.
I was mainly try to encourage you to add a little more meat to your articles in the future. Complaining about Mythics and about how drafts aren't very profitible is a decent starting point for an article, but if that's the entirety of it, it seems a bit shallow.
I've liked reading your past articles as you're very good at writing in an entertaining, lighthearted, and fun manner, and I would like to see more articles like that in the future. However, this article seemed to be less fun and more about complaining.
And 2.5 weeks is a pretty long wait time. I was begining to think I was the only one with articles stuck in limbo for weeks on end.
Play the relic and tap it for red and bolt his 4/1 before he untaps. Zoo could play pump spells, I guess, so the only reason to let them untap first is they could have a larger hasty face you want to bolt instead. This play also incentivizes opponent to drop a guy or two so you can Damnation next turn, charge the relic to set up for a turn 6 ultimatum with red up for bolt.
"While these points are very true, they don't really mean very much to me." So you agree with my points but dont care about them?
" In essence, the point of your article is drafting isn't profitable so I'm quitting."- In essence the point of my article is drafting isnt profitable. I never said I was quitting. I just wont play in modern era drafts. They are a money sink. I'd rather paly constructed (more bang for the buck).
"The least you could have done was talk about the classic drafts. They are still really good if you happen to like rare drafting, and they never had mythics." Youre right I could of talked about classic drafts. And the cards there do hold value. The main reason I did not talk about them is they are off the radar. Unless there is a celebration with nix pax or nix tix. They just dont fire that often. Now the only exception may be Te-TE-TE. I bet that would fire pretty regularly. The average drafter wants to jump into a queue and have it fire in under 5 minutes. Not sit there and wait and wait and wait for it to fire (if it even does fire). The majority of drafters are playing in the current standard series.
And when I wrote this article (2 and half weeks ago submitted) they had not announced the winter celebration.
Just to be less confusing, here is cut and pasted text from the Holiday Celebration Announcement....
Mirage Block Nix Tix and Nix Pax Drafts
START TIME: On demand beginning after the scheduled downtime on December 15 until the downtime on December 22.
Tempest Block Nix Tix and Nix Pax Drafts
START TIME: On demand beginning after the scheduled downtime on December 22 until the downtime on December 29.
I thought that was next "next" week. Next week we get Mirage... Not that $60 rares and $10 uncommons are less appealing :p
Your main points seem to be as follows
1) Drafts are not profitable.
2) Mythic rares make drafts less profitable over the long term.
While these points are very true, they don't really mean very much to me. In essence, the point of your article is drafting isn't profitable so I'm quitting.
The least you could have done was talk about the classic drafts. They are still really good if you happen to like rare drafting, and they never had mythics.
For example, next week after the down-time Tempest block becomes available in both Nix Tix and Nix Pack forms. Now that set is a rare-drafter's dream, with a $5 common (Lotus Petal) and a $35 uncommon (Wasteland) among many other choice not-so-rare-or-mythic money cards.
Does this mean we can finally use the vastly superior V2.5 build again? ... Please?
Mythics are bad IMO. They hurt the average player base, and frustrate new players. They don't seem to make new players aspire to get them, they seem out of reach, and develop a "why bother" attitude in them, or at least this is what I have seen in the paper world. I personally am not shy about spending $ on this game, at all. I knew that from the "digital door" having played paper for years, and years. I will say I own 0 Jace, and with stores buying for 90, if I was to draft one... I would sell it.
I used to wait till after a cards departure from standard to pick up things like Jace, but sadly with the redemption of these sets causing (mythic) cards to keep their value after rotation due to the mythics being sucked from the system, I have resigned to never owning one till a Duel Decks: Big Jace comes out (my guess is 3 weeks before WWK rotates out, seems to be the pattern).
I wrote in an article a while ago, that I would like to see mythic rarity used for chase versions of existing cards (alternate art, zendikar's hidden treasures, timeshifted, etc..) but never again for obvious tournament staples.
As for the WOTC buisness end, they are making money hand over fist at the moment, largely due to mythics. This looks great on a shareholder report, and makes people get raises, however this strategy fails to plan for the future, and with damage to the morale of the overall player base, especially concering beginners, I should expect a 4-5 year period of decline not long in the foreseeable future. All bubbles tend to burst.
The other thought from me actually springboards from a thought from Hammy in one of his articles. They are developing a system to be able to "print and distribute single cards". By creating "unobtainable" cards they nearly guarantee a full sell out of massive quantities of the FTV decks, and cleverly they are only releasing them once the purchase of the existing packs containing these mythics has slowed to nongain. This seems to be about 3-5 weeks before the "hot card" contained in the precon would rotate out. A kind of brilliant strategy actually, but I still feel this fails to help player morale for the bulk of time.
More interesting to me is the backlash from players online to mythics. I can no longer count the number of games I get conceded on, with a foul remark due to the inclusion of one or more mythics in my deck. This is extremely more at this point then those who concede due to my deck's overall value (dual lands, foils, etc..) which I have grown to expect.
I want to be clear. MYTHICS do not overall negatively affect me personally. However, they damage morale in many ways, and make me fear a bit for the longevity of the game. As a stakeholder in the success of this game, and of WOTC/HASBRO in general this frustrates me enormously.
As for drafting. I also have stopped drafting non classic sets, due to all the same reasons as above. it's just not worth it, and leaves me feeling low, even when I do well. I am done with it.
Good read, and I agree with most of it..
Thanks.
practise makes perfect, but nobody's perfect so why practice ?
While others are asking price questions...I bought Wargate for $0.10 not long ago and now it's 3.00...has the rise really been so slow it shouldn't have appeared on your charts at some point?
If the situation had been altered, and someone had bought him out of Asceticisms, I don't think he would have minded. I thought one of their overall goals was to actually sell cards. If anything, I attribute this mishap to the owner of the bot, or whoever sets the prices, for not keeping up with the latest trends.
I'm unaware of any other bot that bans its customers for buying cards in bulk.
Colloquialisms ftw? (or l if you dislike such things.)
:) Sure if you like...but you asked a question with an obvious answer. So... :D
When it was created there was no concept of a stack. There was lifo but even that was tricky to describe. The stack formalized Lifo and made rules about what could or could not be stacked etc as well as introducing some concepts like triggers and events. It will have an upto date oracle wording on it's digital face when it comes online.
Ah having read the full card on the client it makes more sense to me. I never actually used the card when it was in print and had it hit me maybe twice in 16++ years total.
Basically it does a couple things with the wording.
1) It makes you the controller of the spell being cast by the player you targeted.
2) You don't have to cast the spell you pick from their hand but it is the only spell you can cast from their hand.
3) The wording also specifies how you can cast it. (Ie you can only use their lands for mana or mana filtering (you could tap Lake of the Dead to sac a swamp for bbbb for instance.) But you can only do this to pay for the spell.
It is a little convoluted still (because of the you control that player phrasing. But Otherwise it is pretty clear.
For example if I have a fireball in hand 3 swamps a lake of the dead and a mountain in play when you cast the word, you can have me cast the fireball at myself (or my creatures or whatever) for x where x is anything from 0 to 7. Any effects that consider the controller count you as the controller of the fireball.
Are we just stating fairly obvious things here?
Black Lotus = Pretty Good Card
i just checked gatherer and this is the text there as well. I thought they updated oracle for all existing cards long ago.
Grabbing up all of a card = attempt to hoard or at least raise the price by main force.
When M11 launched I sold off my playset of M10 Jace's for 6 tix a piece and bought up a set of M11 Jaces for 4 tix a piece...
For what it's worth I felt really bad about it >.<
"I need to wrap up here. I'm distracted. I drove 200 miles to run a paper tournament, and I got caught in a blizzard. The stores and malls closed, and the tournament is cancelled. Now I have to get home. I can see traffic from the hotel room - semis look to be moving about 10 mph - and this is in town. It is going to be a long drive. "
Sounds like groundhog day to me
i dont understand word of command. "You control that player until Word of Command finishes resolving" does not make sense at all. How do you execute controlling the player part if te spell is not resolved yet (aka on the stack)?why would they choose such a poor wording?
There must be something wrong with your spell check, it's spelled Christmas. 80)
I've been digging a GW Ramp deck myself lately. It's been doing pretty good in 2mans and I just took it to a 3-1 finish in a Daily Event.
Cardbot does this as well.
It takes a larger number of sales to make the price change, since they have more volume.
Wait...you banned someone for buying cards from you?
"...be wary of result oriented practice..." - great point.