Good article - maybe differing views from players/collectors/readers on some of the content.
What interests me is what price do people think the new multis will hit. Something I have been pondering as the prices drop on them.
Assuming the following:
Underground Seas was approx 40 Tix pre MED4
Now people have slashed prices by upward of 40% on these alone. What amuses me is no one has mentioned the fact that there could be more demand with more players in classic than the potential supply could be coming in from MED4.
This could mean all the speculators never stopped and said - well 1 in 10 players had a set of seas - even doubling the no of multi's in the systems means unless player interest in classic/vintage/legacy/multis increases less than the multilands number increase - certain high demand cards may actually go back close to their original price even with the reprint.
That and the fact that I know few players who don't have a seas who play a format where they can be used - would be unlikely to trade them away for bottom end buying price e.g. 10 tix.
I think some multilands because of this are going to see some interesting long term changes.
Of course this is relative to as I mentioned the increase in players in the formats vs multiland cracking rates. If MED4 is a slow mover some multis could quickly back to their pre MED4 pricing.
Just food for thought - and I would be interested to see what people think of this.
I have no reason to doubt my source. I'm sure some of the higher-ups will tell you the exact same thing, if you decide you want to find out for yourself.
Pete I'd like to see some pictures in part 2. I know what the cards look like, but it's nice to break up the visual space. I know it's harder to make gatherer images show up Pure, but it's not impossible.
Force of Nature has always been rare, so I don't really see the problem with that.
I agree with you guys about the bad rares. It's going to be tough to open a dual. Theories about Power 9 being removed at the last minute aside, I would think this was done for limited. They put all the narrow and constructed cards at rare. The problem is that many of those aren't constructed-playable these days.
Pyro/hydro you can target any permanent or spell. It checks color upon resolution...so they are technically "worse" than the BEB/REB as they can't be redirected.
EDH players are going to be happy to see this... it breaks cabal coffers, the lands that produce more than 1 mana, and lands when using mirari's wake, mana reflection, etc.
Black borders were not always the standard. They used to have white border cards. So too, foil cards CAN become the new standard. Just as they eliminated white borders, so too may they eliminate non-foil cards. =p In fact, it doesn't cost anything more, as you said, for them to give us all foils. I'm not sure I buy this "right to black borders" argument. Why can't we make foils the standard water and eliminate Perrier altogether?
Why not just make current white bordered sets black bordered online, to fall in line with policy? Why not make 7th Ed., for example, black bordered? It wouldn't cost anything and would only be a bit of programming. People obviously hate them, so why not?
Anyway, I don't know where you got the impression of a human right to black borders. LOL Your only right is to buy or not to buy. The only rights regarding borders are gold and silver aren't tournament legal. The bottom line is current practice doesn't equal eternal policy. Portal, Starter, P3K were once banned sets, but are now tourney legal. Times change and there is no such thing as eternal rights.
This idea that people want it and therefore that should be what you give them is weakened by the lack of Power Nine. I see really no oppositional voices from the customer base. Sure some are apathetic, but I see no vocal opposition; yet, here we are with no P9. In short, it seems like it's Wizards' policy to ignore customer desires. =p So, white borders all the way! ;)
Even if some of your articles were interesting and well written, I have to say that I highly disagree with many contents here. I not only disagree with the content but also with the prophetical way it is written. Sorry for that but I'm honest.
Firstly, if you're speaking about history of magic, there's a point you cannot hide or forget : Magic was a collectible card game. Yes collectible. That was how the game was conceived at the beginning. And this incredibly interesting game also built a large part of its success on that. And what you related about reprints just avoid that, it is a uncomplete way to relate the real mtg evolution as it was a very important notion, never ever really neither even mentioned nor explained in that article.
Secondly, because yes, one could admitt that mtg was kinda victim of its own success, of its rarity system in recruiting new players. Almost everyone loving the game knows that reprints are important for the developpement of the player pool. But that should be done with in a smart way. At least in a way that provides respect of the player who invested in the game. Not with an arbitrary decision, done without any form of communication, which goes straight against most faithful player without any reasons. If you buy a house with your hardly earned money, will you be happy to see its price falling at the half 2 weeks after having bought it without any reasons ? Really ? Let's be honest. The exemple is extrem and nothing important compared to mtg as well, but it however shows the idea behind. Reprints are good, sure. But I can honestly not find any argument to a player who invested an important amount of money in cards, hardly won some tournaments during one of 2 years then sell prizes in order to buy dual and then, because WotC isnt able to get a normal communication, loose what he invested. Not really, that's not fair. At least, yes, a difference should be made in reprint (alt art, white border ...). This choosen way with dual was clearly disrepectful regarding these points to me.
Lastly, providing advices or opinions is the aim of articles, no matter with that. But please, dont place you as a prophet with sentences like "everyone needs to accept that. Anyone who thinks that any Magic card is a "sure thing" financially is wrong"... What does it mean seriously ? Call it *your opinion*, but who on earth are you to tell to everyone how to conceive the game, or what everyone should do ? I much prefer humility and objectivity in articles than semi-truth and tendencial wording. and that's my opinion. Sorry if these lines were brutal, but having reading that after I have rade so many articles, played mtg almost since the beginning, and especialy because I am a fervant mtg enthusiast, I felt the necessity to express all my feelings about it.
I'm sorry if you take offense at that, it wasn't intended! I was just joking with that human mind comment. Also, true human behaviour is unpredictable for most of us (myself included), moreso when talking about something a little bit maniacal to begin with, like collecting. :)
In my opinion (take it as humble as you can, I'm not very humble, but that's my fault :)), you can't compare black-bordered with foil. Black border is the basic design now, probably 90% of all the cards in existence are black-bordered. Foil is the extra thing. That is for snobs, if you want. Black border is the usual thing. This is what WoTC should give all players. That's why I'm fine with players not having any problem playing white-bordered (it's their business, after all), but I'm not fine at all with a reprint, whose goal is to give more players access to essential cards, doing it through white-bordered cards, because that would mean defend privileges not earned in any way.
You can't be called a snob if you just want to play with the cards like they are supposed to be. If rich/snob/whatever people want to have a very supermegafabulous deck, they can hunt for foil cards. Those are more expensive for a reason, the same way there's a reason diamonds are more expensive than other stones - rarity.
I can't accept a company telling its customers, "Hey, we know, these basic goods which weren't supposed to be expensive have become very expensive now. You know what? We can give you a facsimile of those goods, bearing a mark which says 'that's not the real thing'. You should be happy."
And I'm saying this also because we're not really talking about diamonds here: it doesn't cost anything more to the company to produce the real goods again. The privileges of those who have just been lucky enough to be there when the first wave of the goods sold out aren't anything I feel the need to defend. There's no reason for that, it's not like mythic foil suddenly becoming common.
To cut it short, I'm talking about the right to have black-bordered cards for everyone. No more, no less. It's like the right to have just pure, basic, black-bordered water to drink. Not premium foil Perrier. Neither white-bordered swamp water. :)
I totally agree on the Clasp - that got me through a lot of close games that probably shouldn't have gone to me.
And the infect deck is definitely tricky, I think you really need to be able to get a couple of decent cards out of the gate to be serious with it. I first-picked the Hand, shrugged, said "why not?" and gave it a try simply because I'd never drafted the archetype.
Yeah, I like the Liege if I can build around it, but at the time I saw it, my deck was not shaping up too well and I was concentrating on giving it a decent framework. (If I remember right, I think I passed it in favor of removal.) Thanks for the comment.
Nothing in your response shows me your superior knowledge of human relations.
Re: people's aversion to white bordered. They were fine with them from Unlimited until Ninth Edition. At a time when Magic was in its youth and its future most precarious.
re: alternate art. Yeah, of course they're WILDLY different concepts, that wasn't what I was implying; rather, I was implying I'd be OK with any way to differentiate the reprints beyond mere expansion symbol. Some people, like me, really value original ABU art more than new, even spectacular, art. I really like the Sol Ring from From the Vaults: Relics, but I nevertheless want the MED4 Alpha art Sol Ring. In this case it would appease your sense of pride for not buying "poor-man's" cards and simply differentiate the MED2/3 duals from their latter printing in a way beyond their expansion symbol.
Re: poor people Magic. So? Why not make cards all premium? Back in the day we had white border cards and black border. Those with more money had black border while those who didn't have the cash had to play ugly white border Birds of Paradise (for example). So, why not shift that to premiums? I could say most players would like ALL cards to be foil and NOT foiling all the cards and making foil standard makes them feel like they're playing poor-people cards. Sorry, I just don't buy this logic at all. The reasoning we are given for reprints like the dual lands in MED4 is to increase supply, so I don't see a problem with people wanting to play cards just playing white border ones. Look at Legacy Dredge. Until MED4 comes out there will have been no black border City of Brass released online other than the foil 7th and 8th Ed ones. People still play the white border ones.
If access is the first priority, I don't see the big harm in creating access to a product that is different than the previous releases. And by your admission, the alternate art method may be MORE successful and bring in MORE revenue than just reprinting the ABU art. I'd be fine with that too. =)
When reading the thread, there are some very pertinent comments in the first few posts. How do you make White-bordered duals without making the whole set White-bordered?
There will be "new" reprints here too. So do we want to needlessly trash them along with the reprinted duals? It would make the whole set look out of place compared to the last three.
Asp "shines" in decks like this - by which I mean "decent but not great" infect decks. In the best aggro infect decks, you just don't have the mana to activate him consistently, because you're curving out stinger->cystbearer->angler->2 creatures on 5, so he's a do-nothing card that can't even be re"cur"ed. In more controlling builds (which I suppose yours ended up, whether by plan or consequence) he can be OK, but he's the definition of 23rd card.
In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that Clasp was the true powerhouse that makes things like Asp look good.
Wing Puncture is a great card - in fact, I've maindecked it in infect a few times. It solves tons of problems, helps with a decent number of the format's true bombs, and it's still infect damage so the counters stick. Your R1 opponent was an idiot.
You certainly got bailed out by pack 3 - sometimes, the packs just aren't strong enough, so either you weren't getting cut as hard as you feared (and the dudes just weren't there) or the guy in front bailed P2. The weak pack theory also helps explain the (very) little removal you faced ... you were quite light on dudes, so in a stronger pack environment I'm not sure you fare as well. For these kinds of infect decks (light on guys), Withstand Death is a surprisingly attractive option, just FYI.
There's definitely an art to drafting the infect deck - thanks for posting this one, and congrats on the win.
They reprinted the entire cycle of dual lands. I like this, even though I spent a lot of TIX getting playsets of them all. I'm losing some of that investment, but I'll make it up in future play opportunities. The duals need to be cheap. Classic has a high enough entry cost in any case – the dual lands need not be super expensive. I want to be able to find opponents in the future, and reprinting the duals makes this more likely.
Yes, I am going to sigh every time I open one of these in limited, but it could be worse. It could be Armageddon Clock.
"Candelabra of Tawnos, 1, Artifact
{X}, {T}: Untap X target lands.
This was broken back in the old Tolarian Academy decks. It is useless until the Power Nine – specifically the cheap artifacts – are reprinted. If and when they are, this will probably be restricted. Yet another waste of a rare slot – although this would probably have been a very good Mythic. After all, you only need one."
I cannot disagree more. I used to ramp colorless mana very fast with this using just the old Urza's lands. Now we have multiple locus lands (with vesuva) decks already constantly seen pumping out eldrazi in the casual room, even without this faster way to use them. I think we will see these added very quickly to those builds.
Now if only we had a large crop of good artifacts come out recently... Or maybe if Mishra's Workshop were to come out online...
I'm not intending to flame in any way here, but I have to admit, your assessment of this card (and several of the cards in this article) read more like an angry rant, then a review.
Cant belive you passed liege of the tangle up. You coulda got him and maby grabed 1 more strike and got more mana myrs and still woulda been set on the infect creatures i think.
Time Vault + Voltaic key does the same thing for 4 mana over 2 cards and multiple turns. what you suggest is unplayable in all but the most casual of games and there it will prolly not be fun or casual to take all the turns
Good article - maybe differing views from players/collectors/readers on some of the content.
What interests me is what price do people think the new multis will hit. Something I have been pondering as the prices drop on them.
Assuming the following:
Underground Seas was approx 40 Tix pre MED4
Now people have slashed prices by upward of 40% on these alone. What amuses me is no one has mentioned the fact that there could be more demand with more players in classic than the potential supply could be coming in from MED4.
This could mean all the speculators never stopped and said - well 1 in 10 players had a set of seas - even doubling the no of multi's in the systems means unless player interest in classic/vintage/legacy/multis increases less than the multilands number increase - certain high demand cards may actually go back close to their original price even with the reprint.
That and the fact that I know few players who don't have a seas who play a format where they can be used - would be unlikely to trade them away for bottom end buying price e.g. 10 tix.
I think some multilands because of this are going to see some interesting long term changes.
Of course this is relative to as I mentioned the increase in players in the formats vs multiland cracking rates. If MED4 is a slow mover some multis could quickly back to their pre MED4 pricing.
Just food for thought - and I would be interested to see what people think of this.
I have no reason to doubt my source. I'm sure some of the higher-ups will tell you the exact same thing, if you decide you want to find out for yourself.
Pete I'd like to see some pictures in part 2. I know what the cards look like, but it's nice to break up the visual space. I know it's harder to make gatherer images show up Pure, but it's not impossible.
Force of Nature has always been rare, so I don't really see the problem with that.
I agree with you guys about the bad rares. It's going to be tough to open a dual. Theories about Power 9 being removed at the last minute aside, I would think this was done for limited. They put all the narrow and constructed cards at rare. The problem is that many of those aren't constructed-playable these days.
It's about the targeting. More relevant is the interaction with Misdirection. Elemental Blasts can't be misdirected.
See also
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?p=3608065
http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/25509893/Pyroblast_and...
Pyro/hydro you can target any permanent or spell. It checks color upon resolution...so they are technically "worse" than the BEB/REB as they can't be redirected.
@greyeyes3. and you believed it? i have very ncie bridge in brooklyn. if you are interested i can sell it to you for a very cheap price?
in what way elemental blasts are different than pyro/hydroblast?
EDH players are going to be happy to see this... it breaks cabal coffers, the lands that produce more than 1 mana, and lands when using mirari's wake, mana reflection, etc.
Maga, Traitor to Mortals says hello
Black borders were not always the standard. They used to have white border cards. So too, foil cards CAN become the new standard. Just as they eliminated white borders, so too may they eliminate non-foil cards. =p In fact, it doesn't cost anything more, as you said, for them to give us all foils. I'm not sure I buy this "right to black borders" argument. Why can't we make foils the standard water and eliminate Perrier altogether?
Why not just make current white bordered sets black bordered online, to fall in line with policy? Why not make 7th Ed., for example, black bordered? It wouldn't cost anything and would only be a bit of programming. People obviously hate them, so why not?
Anyway, I don't know where you got the impression of a human right to black borders. LOL Your only right is to buy or not to buy. The only rights regarding borders are gold and silver aren't tournament legal. The bottom line is current practice doesn't equal eternal policy. Portal, Starter, P3K were once banned sets, but are now tourney legal. Times change and there is no such thing as eternal rights.
This idea that people want it and therefore that should be what you give them is weakened by the lack of Power Nine. I see really no oppositional voices from the customer base. Sure some are apathetic, but I see no vocal opposition; yet, here we are with no P9. In short, it seems like it's Wizards' policy to ignore customer desires. =p So, white borders all the way! ;)
Even if some of your articles were interesting and well written, I have to say that I highly disagree with many contents here. I not only disagree with the content but also with the prophetical way it is written. Sorry for that but I'm honest.
Firstly, if you're speaking about history of magic, there's a point you cannot hide or forget : Magic was a collectible card game. Yes collectible. That was how the game was conceived at the beginning. And this incredibly interesting game also built a large part of its success on that. And what you related about reprints just avoid that, it is a uncomplete way to relate the real mtg evolution as it was a very important notion, never ever really neither even mentioned nor explained in that article.
Secondly, because yes, one could admitt that mtg was kinda victim of its own success, of its rarity system in recruiting new players. Almost everyone loving the game knows that reprints are important for the developpement of the player pool. But that should be done with in a smart way. At least in a way that provides respect of the player who invested in the game. Not with an arbitrary decision, done without any form of communication, which goes straight against most faithful player without any reasons. If you buy a house with your hardly earned money, will you be happy to see its price falling at the half 2 weeks after having bought it without any reasons ? Really ? Let's be honest. The exemple is extrem and nothing important compared to mtg as well, but it however shows the idea behind. Reprints are good, sure. But I can honestly not find any argument to a player who invested an important amount of money in cards, hardly won some tournaments during one of 2 years then sell prizes in order to buy dual and then, because WotC isnt able to get a normal communication, loose what he invested. Not really, that's not fair. At least, yes, a difference should be made in reprint (alt art, white border ...). This choosen way with dual was clearly disrepectful regarding these points to me.
Lastly, providing advices or opinions is the aim of articles, no matter with that. But please, dont place you as a prophet with sentences like "everyone needs to accept that. Anyone who thinks that any Magic card is a "sure thing" financially is wrong"... What does it mean seriously ? Call it *your opinion*, but who on earth are you to tell to everyone how to conceive the game, or what everyone should do ? I much prefer humility and objectivity in articles than semi-truth and tendencial wording. and that's my opinion. Sorry if these lines were brutal, but having reading that after I have rade so many articles, played mtg almost since the beginning, and especialy because I am a fervant mtg enthusiast, I felt the necessity to express all my feelings about it.
I'm sorry if you take offense at that, it wasn't intended! I was just joking with that human mind comment. Also, true human behaviour is unpredictable for most of us (myself included), moreso when talking about something a little bit maniacal to begin with, like collecting. :)
In my opinion (take it as humble as you can, I'm not very humble, but that's my fault :)), you can't compare black-bordered with foil. Black border is the basic design now, probably 90% of all the cards in existence are black-bordered. Foil is the extra thing. That is for snobs, if you want. Black border is the usual thing. This is what WoTC should give all players. That's why I'm fine with players not having any problem playing white-bordered (it's their business, after all), but I'm not fine at all with a reprint, whose goal is to give more players access to essential cards, doing it through white-bordered cards, because that would mean defend privileges not earned in any way.
You can't be called a snob if you just want to play with the cards like they are supposed to be. If rich/snob/whatever people want to have a very supermegafabulous deck, they can hunt for foil cards. Those are more expensive for a reason, the same way there's a reason diamonds are more expensive than other stones - rarity.
I can't accept a company telling its customers, "Hey, we know, these basic goods which weren't supposed to be expensive have become very expensive now. You know what? We can give you a facsimile of those goods, bearing a mark which says 'that's not the real thing'. You should be happy."
And I'm saying this also because we're not really talking about diamonds here: it doesn't cost anything more to the company to produce the real goods again. The privileges of those who have just been lucky enough to be there when the first wave of the goods sold out aren't anything I feel the need to defend. There's no reason for that, it's not like mythic foil suddenly becoming common.
To cut it short, I'm talking about the right to have black-bordered cards for everyone. No more, no less. It's like the right to have just pure, basic, black-bordered water to drink. Not premium foil Perrier. Neither white-bordered swamp water. :)
"I can rattle on about the history and theory of Magic for pages and pages"
And I would love to read them all! So please, do it! :)
I totally agree on the Clasp - that got me through a lot of close games that probably shouldn't have gone to me.
And the infect deck is definitely tricky, I think you really need to be able to get a couple of decent cards out of the gate to be serious with it. I first-picked the Hand, shrugged, said "why not?" and gave it a try simply because I'd never drafted the archetype.
Thanks for your comment, and the advice.
Yeah, I like the Liege if I can build around it, but at the time I saw it, my deck was not shaping up too well and I was concentrating on giving it a decent framework. (If I remember right, I think I passed it in favor of removal.) Thanks for the comment.
Nothing in your response shows me your superior knowledge of human relations.
Re: people's aversion to white bordered. They were fine with them from Unlimited until Ninth Edition. At a time when Magic was in its youth and its future most precarious.
re: alternate art. Yeah, of course they're WILDLY different concepts, that wasn't what I was implying; rather, I was implying I'd be OK with any way to differentiate the reprints beyond mere expansion symbol. Some people, like me, really value original ABU art more than new, even spectacular, art. I really like the Sol Ring from From the Vaults: Relics, but I nevertheless want the MED4 Alpha art Sol Ring. In this case it would appease your sense of pride for not buying "poor-man's" cards and simply differentiate the MED2/3 duals from their latter printing in a way beyond their expansion symbol.
Re: poor people Magic. So? Why not make cards all premium? Back in the day we had white border cards and black border. Those with more money had black border while those who didn't have the cash had to play ugly white border Birds of Paradise (for example). So, why not shift that to premiums? I could say most players would like ALL cards to be foil and NOT foiling all the cards and making foil standard makes them feel like they're playing poor-people cards. Sorry, I just don't buy this logic at all. The reasoning we are given for reprints like the dual lands in MED4 is to increase supply, so I don't see a problem with people wanting to play cards just playing white border ones. Look at Legacy Dredge. Until MED4 comes out there will have been no black border City of Brass released online other than the foil 7th and 8th Ed ones. People still play the white border ones.
If access is the first priority, I don't see the big harm in creating access to a product that is different than the previous releases. And by your admission, the alternate art method may be MORE successful and bring in MORE revenue than just reprinting the ABU art. I'd be fine with that too. =)
When reading the thread, there are some very pertinent comments in the first few posts. How do you make White-bordered duals without making the whole set White-bordered?
There will be "new" reprints here too. So do we want to needlessly trash them along with the reprinted duals? It would make the whole set look out of place compared to the last three.
It's not exactly a newish card either though lol.
It's not exactly a newish card either though lol.
Asp "shines" in decks like this - by which I mean "decent but not great" infect decks. In the best aggro infect decks, you just don't have the mana to activate him consistently, because you're curving out stinger->cystbearer->angler->2 creatures on 5, so he's a do-nothing card that can't even be re"cur"ed. In more controlling builds (which I suppose yours ended up, whether by plan or consequence) he can be OK, but he's the definition of 23rd card.
In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that Clasp was the true powerhouse that makes things like Asp look good.
Wing Puncture is a great card - in fact, I've maindecked it in infect a few times. It solves tons of problems, helps with a decent number of the format's true bombs, and it's still infect damage so the counters stick. Your R1 opponent was an idiot.
You certainly got bailed out by pack 3 - sometimes, the packs just aren't strong enough, so either you weren't getting cut as hard as you feared (and the dudes just weren't there) or the guy in front bailed P2. The weak pack theory also helps explain the (very) little removal you faced ... you were quite light on dudes, so in a stronger pack environment I'm not sure you fare as well. For these kinds of infect decks (light on guys), Withstand Death is a surprisingly attractive option, just FYI.
There's definitely an art to drafting the infect deck - thanks for posting this one, and congrats on the win.
Badlands, Land — Swamp Mountain
They reprinted the entire cycle of dual lands. I like this, even though I spent a lot of TIX getting playsets of them all. I'm losing some of that investment, but I'll make it up in future play opportunities. The duals need to be cheap. Classic has a high enough entry cost in any case – the dual lands need not be super expensive. I want to be able to find opponents in the future, and reprinting the duals makes this more likely.
Yes, I am going to sigh every time I open one of these in limited, but it could be worse. It could be Armageddon Clock.
Energy Flux
"Still, it best hoses decks that play a lot of artifacts, plus mana denial, and those decks are not coming online until the P9 arrive."
Wanna bet, Pete?
you state:
"Candelabra of Tawnos, 1, Artifact
{X}, {T}: Untap X target lands.
This was broken back in the old Tolarian Academy decks. It is useless until the Power Nine – specifically the cheap artifacts – are reprinted. If and when they are, this will probably be restricted. Yet another waste of a rare slot – although this would probably have been a very good Mythic. After all, you only need one."
I cannot disagree more. I used to ramp colorless mana very fast with this using just the old Urza's lands. Now we have multiple locus lands (with vesuva) decks already constantly seen pumping out eldrazi in the casual room, even without this faster way to use them. I think we will see these added very quickly to those builds.
Now if only we had a large crop of good artifacts come out recently... Or maybe if Mishra's Workshop were to come out online...
I'm not intending to flame in any way here, but I have to admit, your assessment of this card (and several of the cards in this article) read more like an angry rant, then a review.
thanks for pointing that out whiffy. voltaic key wasnt available fifteen years ago so the thought didnt cross my mind.
Cant belive you passed liege of the tangle up. You coulda got him and maby grabed 1 more strike and got more mana myrs and still woulda been set on the infect creatures i think.
Time Vault + Voltaic key does the same thing for 4 mana over 2 cards and multiple turns. what you suggest is unplayable in all but the most casual of games and there it will prolly not be fun or casual to take all the turns