Legacy, Vintage prize payouts will change to VMA come Wed after downtime. So you should be seeing P9 in the classifieds and bots on Wed. The Prerelease for VMA starts at 10 am (pst time I am assuming) on Friday.
The original Shattering Spree is cast and triggers Chalice. The replicate copies are placed on the stack and do not trigger it. So yea, if you're seeing alot of Chalices, Shattering Spree is a good answer. As a side not, Storm functions the same way in that the original card is countered and all of the copies resolve successfully.
I'm currently in a bit of a financial slump, and can't afford to play much right now. But as soon as possible I plan on actually owning all my decks online in the future.
That's certainly possible, but to argue the other side of that, people frequently don't know what the money cards are in a set (think LED/Lotus petal/tutors) and even this week I saw someone ask, "Is there any money in D-I-I drafts?" which is a format that includes the $70 Lil. I do think that Vintage probably can overcome that, but it might not.
Regrettably, I can't make it this week owing to a family commitment. Romellos, I salute you taking on RexDart's challenge: With so many opportunities for extra prizes available, it would make for a better event if more people went for them.
There is no prospect of the Lotus being close in price (medium term) of Wasteland with present supply/demand unless VMA totally fails.
Every Legacy player wants 4 Wastelands. Most Vintage players want 4. Compare to Lotus, Vintage players want 1 and Legacy players do not want it.
Lotus is simply too common (at one playset, which is 1 card, personally opened per ~160 drafts), compared to Wasteland (one playset personally opened per ~145 drafts in a much less popular draft format).
In the absence of more Wastelands entering the system, I would be stunned if a full set of P9 gets even CLOSE to the price of a set of four Wastelands once the initial hype is over.
I always battle my own demons between how to "make a read" on a digital card game, BUT I have become very good in the art of a modo bluff. Simply tapping and untapping a land at the right time can change the complexion of the whole game.
Nothing blows your mind more than reacting to something you are sure your opponent has, when they don't... :)
Here's the problem with your logic above - when people see the cards (which you say will cost > $200 each) are DRAFTABLE - human nature says a ton of ppl will be in those queues. Do you know how many people drafted Tempest for a MYTHIC uncommon? Literally - if you do 20 drafts in a week you have only "opened" 60 Tempest uncommons - and there are 110!!!!
The other problem is they are a touch less rare than they look, because you really CAN'T use more than one.
I call HOOEY - but I do agree with 100+ for lotus, long term. I even think $150 would be fair.
I can get behind running 3 Searing Blood, and I think Shattering Spree is fine if you expect a lot of MUD and such. I'm not sure how Spree works with Chalice of the Void, which may be why he included it, I just hate spells that don't deal damage in a burn deck. Extra Pyrostatic effects are good if you expect a lot of combo, and Relic is a necessary evil against dredge and reanimator. It is very meta dependent, and I have been able to race dredge rather easily most of the time, especially manaless.
It don't think it'll matter even if all the rest of the cards drop 75%, people will still see that (under the assumptions herein) a set of Power costs $1800, and they won't even bother. If Force at $400 for a playset was a problem before, Power at $1800 might as well be like climbing Mt. Everest. Power absolutely has to be under $600-700 for the format to have any chance.
For better or worse, people look at the initial price tag rather than the total cost to own. Think of car buying. People would be hesitant to buy a $40,000 car, but when you break down the payments to $400/month, even if it takes 84 months and in the end costs $56,000 (due to interest), they still find that more reasonable.
It is interesting looking at MMA, I have not done any analysis on MMA but it seems you are saying even with a lot of low priced rares/mythics and packs with a low EV because of it that people still drafted a lot and card prices stayed low due to the supply.
The only logic that I can think of on how this could happen is if people loved the "fun" of the format so much that they didn't mind losing money on it. I guess I would ask those who drafted MMA a lot, did you tend to lose money on drafting (assuming you are an average drafter and not winning every tourney) and keep doing it due to the enjoyment? MMA was only available for a short time as well Scott so it could be the format worked because it was new but would have died over a longer timeframe.
In terms of ditching vintage, I suppose one thing to consider is maybe P9 is expensive but if the other staples drop a lot like they already have then total cost of a vintage deck might be less than classic by a lot because P9 is a 1 of and other staples are 4 of's. But I am sort of worried with all the "junk" rares I see in the set.
See, here's the thing: MMA had a much higher percentage of junk rares. The only rares worth anything in MMA were Cryptic, Ravager, Shackles, Kataki, Explosives, Vial, and maybe 1 or two others. At the time MMA was being drafted, even Blood Moon was not worth much... I think I bought foil ones for $3 each. There were a bunch of rares between $0.5 and $1, but very little over $1. The Mythics weren't exactly breath-taking either with only 'Goyf, Bob, Clique and Kiki-Jiki (which was just released in FTV a few months earlier) that even saw any play in Modern. The Swords were probably only interesting to people who were casual or preferred the new art.
By any calculation, 'Goyf should've been a $200 card in order to get the EV of MMA even remotely close to $7. While 'Goyf was a reprint, people need 4 of it (generally) unlike Power which people only need 1 of unless they are kindly hoarding them.
It's hard to put an accurate price estimation on Power, but I have a hard time seeing any card sustain a price >$100, even Lotus. Consider MM Block Packs, the odds of pulling one Port was something like 1:180, yet during MM block release and shortly thereafter, Port was a ~$35 card. Yes Port /=Power, but I think more Power will be opened during VM release and thereafter (since it'll likely replace some if not all of the MMA events that have fired in the last year since MMA was "pulled off the MTGO digital shelves") than there are Ports in the system.
Besides, a $200 average price would not last once people completely ditched Vintage. I would probably quit too and buy paper Power.
You may be right and that was my thought before doing the analysis. So outside of just *thinking* it is too high, what is your logic of why within a month of release only the lotus will be above 100? I am interested in hearing it...
I hope this analysis is waaaaay off. If power is running an average of $200 a piece then I will not buy any at all (not because I cannot afford them, but because that price point will virtually guarantee a dead format in 6 months time). No matter how good the draft format is I won't draft it much either (as I already have everything I need save for power). If people wouldn't play classic because of needing 4x $130 FoW and some $30-40 Duals they will certainly not be willing to pay nearly $2k for a set of power. If Vintage is going to be just like classic was the last few years, then count me out =/
I actually prefer G/U (I probably mentioned this before) in the format, but I keep getting good reasons to go into White. I will start presenting all of my picks the next time. I feel like when I started doing the Recaps, fewer people were submitting them to the site, so I wasn't quite sure what the convention was.
I've had some early success with Golden Hind, which may have lead to me slightly over-valuing it. Even though it may not sound all that great, going T2 Golden Hind into T3 Ravenous Leucrocota has been really good!
I do not doubt the power of Eidolon on Great Revel, but I feel like I can rarely get those decks. I appreciate the power though!
Thanks! I think this will help. Sometimes I get lazy and paste the code from a previous week's article, so that may be the issue (that is, I'll let the browser handle it next time). Thanks again for the help!
Great article - thanks. I really believe in your third point re analyzing your decisions. In almost every situation, you need to ask yourself - how will my opponent react - or - what could my opponent do if I do "X". Looking at how many cards they have in hand, how much open mana, what colours are they playing (what cards could they have), and how much mana will they possibly have next turn, all need to be considered. Also look at the crack-back opportunity if you attack into them. I can't estimate how many times I've lost because I left one measly blocker back to stave off his attack - only to have him produce the removal/bounce spell. I always forget to play around the pump, bounce, or removal spell that in hindsight should have been obvious.
In reading about Poker once, I saw (I paraphrase) -- "Good players think about what their opponent might have. Great players think about what their opponent thinks that they have." I suspect it will be similar in Magic. When I get to the point when I am thinking about what my opponent thinks I am doing - I'll be in a better place as far as my win percentage goes. For now, I'll be happy if I can just remember to think about what my opponent might be able to do.
The reason your screenshot pix are stretched is because of how you sized them. In html if you specify both a width and height attribute in the image tag (img) you will end up changing the aspect ratio of the image unless it is exactly the same as the file's aspect ratio. This leads to stretched or flattened images.
Next time try using inline css to just specify your width and leave out specifying height. Or don't specify and let the browser handle it. (You can also do some creative cropping to get the height and width the right ratios.)
At least I'm not the only one that seems to be getting on the GW train too often :).
In my last draft, I tried to force U - ended up in UW, but there were 5 of us trying to draft U at the table. The UR player ended up winning the draft (but I did make it to the finals at least). I like the screen shots - it is easier to dissect the picture of a board state than re-create it in my head. Would like to see the rest of your picks though... In your draft today, I probably would have started with the Cloaked Siren over the Golden Hind, but both are reasonable first picks. Maybe you could have taken the Armory of Iroas and stayed neutral... it looks like the blue dries up mid-way through pack 1, so I think you may have made a better choice. Funnily, I also opened the Eidolon of Great Revel in my draft, and I lost to it in the last round :). Card is actually very good in an aggressive RW deck...
yeah that was my um intent. I wasn't exhausted and not proof-reading or anything :P If you want, I could just transpose and start calling you the letter I left out, Agor.
I see your point about cutting Blue there. I figured the fetchland that early is really important, but maybe it's right to take Miscalculation instead (since it obviously will make the deck).
Also: Exactly one (1) Constructed Qualifier has fired. At this rate there will be no championship.
Legacy, Vintage prize payouts will change to VMA come Wed after downtime. So you should be seeing P9 in the classifieds and bots on Wed. The Prerelease for VMA starts at 10 am (pst time I am assuming) on Friday.
The name of the fall set is KHANS of Tarkir, not KAHNS of Tarkir.
It's not a Jewish-themed set.
The original Shattering Spree is cast and triggers Chalice. The replicate copies are placed on the stack and do not trigger it. So yea, if you're seeing alot of Chalices, Shattering Spree is a good answer. As a side not, Storm functions the same way in that the original card is countered and all of the copies resolve successfully.
I'm currently in a bit of a financial slump, and can't afford to play much right now. But as soon as possible I plan on actually owning all my decks online in the future.
That's certainly possible, but to argue the other side of that, people frequently don't know what the money cards are in a set (think LED/Lotus petal/tutors) and even this week I saw someone ask, "Is there any money in D-I-I drafts?" which is a format that includes the $70 Lil. I do think that Vintage probably can overcome that, but it might not.
Regrettably, I can't make it this week owing to a family commitment. Romellos, I salute you taking on RexDart's challenge: With so many opportunities for extra prizes available, it would make for a better event if more people went for them.
There is no prospect of the Lotus being close in price (medium term) of Wasteland with present supply/demand unless VMA totally fails.
Every Legacy player wants 4 Wastelands. Most Vintage players want 4. Compare to Lotus, Vintage players want 1 and Legacy players do not want it.
Lotus is simply too common (at one playset, which is 1 card, personally opened per ~160 drafts), compared to Wasteland (one playset personally opened per ~145 drafts in a much less popular draft format).
In the absence of more Wastelands entering the system, I would be stunned if a full set of P9 gets even CLOSE to the price of a set of four Wastelands once the initial hype is over.
Thank you much for the reply - and good point.
I always battle my own demons between how to "make a read" on a digital card game, BUT I have become very good in the art of a modo bluff. Simply tapping and untapping a land at the right time can change the complexion of the whole game.
Nothing blows your mind more than reacting to something you are sure your opponent has, when they don't... :)
You guys (Woof and Ender) are NUTS!
Here's the problem with your logic above - when people see the cards (which you say will cost > $200 each) are DRAFTABLE - human nature says a ton of ppl will be in those queues. Do you know how many people drafted Tempest for a MYTHIC uncommon? Literally - if you do 20 drafts in a week you have only "opened" 60 Tempest uncommons - and there are 110!!!!
The other problem is they are a touch less rare than they look, because you really CAN'T use more than one.
I call HOOEY - but I do agree with 100+ for lotus, long term. I even think $150 would be fair.
Z
For the record, I wrote and submitted this article BEFORE Jon Thiel made top 16 at SCG Indianapolis with an almost identical list.
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=68367
I can get behind running 3 Searing Blood, and I think Shattering Spree is fine if you expect a lot of MUD and such. I'm not sure how Spree works with Chalice of the Void, which may be why he included it, I just hate spells that don't deal damage in a burn deck. Extra Pyrostatic effects are good if you expect a lot of combo, and Relic is a necessary evil against dredge and reanimator. It is very meta dependent, and I have been able to race dredge rather easily most of the time, especially manaless.
It don't think it'll matter even if all the rest of the cards drop 75%, people will still see that (under the assumptions herein) a set of Power costs $1800, and they won't even bother. If Force at $400 for a playset was a problem before, Power at $1800 might as well be like climbing Mt. Everest. Power absolutely has to be under $600-700 for the format to have any chance.
For better or worse, people look at the initial price tag rather than the total cost to own. Think of car buying. People would be hesitant to buy a $40,000 car, but when you break down the payments to $400/month, even if it takes 84 months and in the end costs $56,000 (due to interest), they still find that more reasonable.
It is interesting looking at MMA, I have not done any analysis on MMA but it seems you are saying even with a lot of low priced rares/mythics and packs with a low EV because of it that people still drafted a lot and card prices stayed low due to the supply.
The only logic that I can think of on how this could happen is if people loved the "fun" of the format so much that they didn't mind losing money on it. I guess I would ask those who drafted MMA a lot, did you tend to lose money on drafting (assuming you are an average drafter and not winning every tourney) and keep doing it due to the enjoyment? MMA was only available for a short time as well Scott so it could be the format worked because it was new but would have died over a longer timeframe.
In terms of ditching vintage, I suppose one thing to consider is maybe P9 is expensive but if the other staples drop a lot like they already have then total cost of a vintage deck might be less than classic by a lot because P9 is a 1 of and other staples are 4 of's. But I am sort of worried with all the "junk" rares I see in the set.
See, here's the thing: MMA had a much higher percentage of junk rares. The only rares worth anything in MMA were Cryptic, Ravager, Shackles, Kataki, Explosives, Vial, and maybe 1 or two others. At the time MMA was being drafted, even Blood Moon was not worth much... I think I bought foil ones for $3 each. There were a bunch of rares between $0.5 and $1, but very little over $1. The Mythics weren't exactly breath-taking either with only 'Goyf, Bob, Clique and Kiki-Jiki (which was just released in FTV a few months earlier) that even saw any play in Modern. The Swords were probably only interesting to people who were casual or preferred the new art.
By any calculation, 'Goyf should've been a $200 card in order to get the EV of MMA even remotely close to $7. While 'Goyf was a reprint, people need 4 of it (generally) unlike Power which people only need 1 of unless they are kindly hoarding them.
It's hard to put an accurate price estimation on Power, but I have a hard time seeing any card sustain a price >$100, even Lotus. Consider MM Block Packs, the odds of pulling one Port was something like 1:180, yet during MM block release and shortly thereafter, Port was a ~$35 card. Yes Port /=Power, but I think more Power will be opened during VM release and thereafter (since it'll likely replace some if not all of the MMA events that have fired in the last year since MMA was "pulled off the MTGO digital shelves") than there are Ports in the system.
Besides, a $200 average price would not last once people completely ditched Vintage. I would probably quit too and buy paper Power.
I kind of agree with you Cownose. Seeing all the "junk" rares in this set and calculating the odds was eye opening to me.
You may be right and that was my thought before doing the analysis. So outside of just *thinking* it is too high, what is your logic of why within a month of release only the lotus will be above 100? I am interested in hearing it...
lol @ $200 for power
There is zero chance of that happening. I would be willing to bet real money that within a month of release only the lotus will be above 100.
I hope this analysis is waaaaay off. If power is running an average of $200 a piece then I will not buy any at all (not because I cannot afford them, but because that price point will virtually guarantee a dead format in 6 months time). No matter how good the draft format is I won't draft it much either (as I already have everything I need save for power). If people wouldn't play classic because of needing 4x $130 FoW and some $30-40 Duals they will certainly not be willing to pay nearly $2k for a set of power. If Vintage is going to be just like classic was the last few years, then count me out =/
I actually prefer G/U (I probably mentioned this before) in the format, but I keep getting good reasons to go into White. I will start presenting all of my picks the next time. I feel like when I started doing the Recaps, fewer people were submitting them to the site, so I wasn't quite sure what the convention was.
I've had some early success with Golden Hind, which may have lead to me slightly over-valuing it. Even though it may not sound all that great, going T2 Golden Hind into T3 Ravenous Leucrocota has been really good!
I do not doubt the power of Eidolon on Great Revel, but I feel like I can rarely get those decks. I appreciate the power though!
Thanks again for reading!
Hi Paul,
Thanks! I think this will help. Sometimes I get lazy and paste the code from a previous week's article, so that may be the issue (that is, I'll let the browser handle it next time). Thanks again for the help!
Great article - thanks. I really believe in your third point re analyzing your decisions. In almost every situation, you need to ask yourself - how will my opponent react - or - what could my opponent do if I do "X". Looking at how many cards they have in hand, how much open mana, what colours are they playing (what cards could they have), and how much mana will they possibly have next turn, all need to be considered. Also look at the crack-back opportunity if you attack into them. I can't estimate how many times I've lost because I left one measly blocker back to stave off his attack - only to have him produce the removal/bounce spell. I always forget to play around the pump, bounce, or removal spell that in hindsight should have been obvious.
In reading about Poker once, I saw (I paraphrase) -- "Good players think about what their opponent might have. Great players think about what their opponent thinks that they have." I suspect it will be similar in Magic. When I get to the point when I am thinking about what my opponent thinks I am doing - I'll be in a better place as far as my win percentage goes. For now, I'll be happy if I can just remember to think about what my opponent might be able to do.
Look forward to reading more from you. Cheers.
The reason your screenshot pix are stretched is because of how you sized them. In html if you specify both a width and height attribute in the image tag (img) you will end up changing the aspect ratio of the image unless it is exactly the same as the file's aspect ratio. This leads to stretched or flattened images.
Next time try using inline css to just specify your width and leave out specifying height. Or don't specify and let the browser handle it. (You can also do some creative cropping to get the height and width the right ratios.)
At least I'm not the only one that seems to be getting on the GW train too often :).
In my last draft, I tried to force U - ended up in UW, but there were 5 of us trying to draft U at the table. The UR player ended up winning the draft (but I did make it to the finals at least). I like the screen shots - it is easier to dissect the picture of a board state than re-create it in my head. Would like to see the rest of your picks though... In your draft today, I probably would have started with the Cloaked Siren over the Golden Hind, but both are reasonable first picks. Maybe you could have taken the Armory of Iroas and stayed neutral... it looks like the blue dries up mid-way through pack 1, so I think you may have made a better choice. Funnily, I also opened the Eidolon of Great Revel in my draft, and I lost to it in the last round :). Card is actually very good in an aggressive RW deck...
Thanks for the draft article - majones12.
yeah that was my um intent. I wasn't exhausted and not proof-reading or anything :P If you want, I could just transpose and start calling you the letter I left out, Agor.
I see your point about cutting Blue there. I figured the fetchland that early is really important, but maybe it's right to take Miscalculation instead (since it obviously will make the deck).
I love Seas too, and it was tough to cut.