Good stuff, I understand you're going purely voltron, but it saddens me that Myr Battlespher is your only token producer. Don't forget that Precursor Golem can turn on metalcraft all by himself as well.
I particularly liked your Clock to Certain Doom countdown. Very fun.
I'm starting it today, should have it finished this week. I wanted to wait until MaRo's articles on cards were up so I didn't make any glaring mistakes and have some direct references. On a plus I hit Heliod's Spear right on!
The problem with blue is that it's not really a control color in Theros. With lack of card draw and a lot of spells being tempo based, blue doesn't really help you play a longer game with black, and it doesn't really have much answers for the gods other than countering them. I think in some form the gods will be played, and mono black doesn't have an answer for the gods other than slamming Gray Merchants before the gods get online. I like starting with B/W. Elspeth is a beast and Heliod (if you play him) can take over long games. Not to mention Whip rebuying Gray Merchant is disgusting.
Benthic Giant is a sweet one. A 4/5 that can't be dealt with removal is solid.
Soldier tribal support with Evangel would be nuts. Any sort of mass creature buff actually.
I agree, the ordeals can be explosive. In Theros a t1 creature into t2 ordeal is almost unbeatable. Not sure about cube, but really you can't expect the opponent to ALWAYS have removal. Lemme know how it goes!
I'll be ignoring the unplayables next time around. Just borderline, cubeable, and staples.
I checked your cube and it looks pretty sweet. Reminds me of a few cards that I need to try out, like Griffin Guide.
Interesting read. I have been working out which Theros addition to make to my Peasant cube, so it was well timed for me.
You opened my eyes to Benthic Giant, I will be giving him a slot. I also will be trying the Nimbus Naiad, she is a decent flyer, but the cost on the bestow is so pricy, I am not sure if she is worth the slot. We shall see.
Overall white seemed pretty weak for cube additions. Heroic just doesn't cut it cube wise. The only white card I am adding is Evangel of Heliod. My cube has a soldier subtheme in white making him a potential bomb.
You say none of the ordeal are worth it, and you may be right. I am going to try the red one though. I like my red hyper aggressive, and if you don't have an answer to "one drop, ordeal on two and swing" it can just bury you fast. It probably is still not be worth it in a cube with good removal, but I want to give it a try.
Looking forward to seeing the rest of the colors. You are probably right that it is not worth mentioning the unplayables. Most stuff in a set will never see a cube so why bother.
Mono-Black certainly looks the strongest upfront. But I wouldn't count out a UB control build nor a base white build either. Omen Speaker seems solid enough and you have Ashiok in UB. In White you've got some very unpleasantly quick weenies, spear of heliod and God's Willing.
However I was interested in seeing if a GBw - reanimation deck was possible, using Ashen Riders, Polukranosusessss, Commune with the Gods, and Rescue form the underworld maybe?
Xenagos is very much from Theros, I'm told he's one of the main characters in the storyline of the novel. He was a Satyr fed up with the "tyranny" of the Gods, and one fateful day his planeswalker spark triggered (don't remember if because of trauma or just naturally), he became a planeswalker, visited other planes, learned things, and came back to Theros to lead the monsters in a revolution against the Gods to overthrow the current pantheon and elevate himself to the divine rank (it's hinted that we may get Xenagos' God card later in the block.) So the human heroes fight for the gods, and the monsters fight for Xenagos. I find it a nice setup because Xenagos is the antagonist here but he's not evil, he wants to take power to change the status quo.
Can't tell if there's a Greek myth that mirrors this story (probably not, seems made up to fit the block's general setup), or a famous "revolutionary" satyr whatsoever. (It'll turn out the main inspiration for him is Castro, maybe :)
I don't complete agree with you some calls:) Looks like you tend to name "hits" expensive cards with high */*.
Vulpine Goliath - i'm pretty sure any aggro can down you to 3-5 before you take this guy out. And flyers will just seal the deal, as this fox doesn't have reach.
Leonin Snarecaster is nothing more than a White Goblin Shortcutter, a card which has seen virtually no play in Standard Pauper - the reason for this was the existing of BUG flicker, which made almost all aggro decks unplayable. There it doesn't matter if the opponent block 5 damage or eats it, if he plays saruli next turn or flicks the creature, before the blocking step. I think now aggro can change into "you can not block this decks", as we have 3 creatures of this kind: arrester (detain), goblin and this new cat. Add haste to this and it could be dangerous.
Lagonna-Band Elder - I think it's a good card for anchants-based WW or selesnya. 3/2 is a good beater and blocker and 3 lives can give you an edge vs aggro. Definitely not bad in a selesnya-colored hexproof deck along with the centaur healer.
You'll put the filters in? (Mmm... this sounds strange. :)
I actually don't like them much, but they are widely played, I'd say more than the SOM ones.
Elspeth Tirel is possibly one of my Top 3 favorite non-gimmicky planeswalkers (and in general, I think the planeswalkers from SOM block were all great, there's not a single misfire in there.) She can wipe the board the turn after she comes in! I think it's a rare, if not unique, case where the ultimate is the first ability you want to — and can! — use.
I've seen some heated debates regarding Hero of Bladehold vs Elspeth K-E. I like both cards, so I can see the merits of either side. I'd lean towards Elspeth since she can make Champions/Deathrites fly in for damage.
I wanted to give Jubilation a try over the other 4 drops, but I never fought Pod to see if she was worth it or not?
Thanks again for reading and for the positive review!
I do love Promise of Bunrei; I played Ghost Husk A LOT that Standard season. Very fond memories.
We can always hope the next 2 sets provide more power for Enchantments in general?
The 4 Wrath was Damnation. (Which I gave them because at the time it tapped up all of their black mana at the very least.)
Yeah, I'd put in the other Fetches for Deathrite.
I'm always curious if Elspeth Tirel could be in the SB as a life gainer that has added value in other ways? I'm just not at the point, yet, where I want to spend the money to give her a try. (too many other staples go get first!!)
I may wind up keeping the Check lands. I have some new ideas on how I want to handle the lands prices, so survival might be in the cards for those Core lands yet.
Aw, when I read "forgotten Kamigawa card", I hoped it was Promise of Bunrei! :)
I've a lot of good memories with that card. I think might still be relevant. I bought a playset recently, as part of the preparation to Theros, because you never know.
Speaking of which, the idea that Theros was an "enchantment set" in the end has revealed as a bit of a mystification, no? There are things that are ALSO enchantments, but there aren't "enchantments matter" cards (or they're just bland, like Lagonna-Band Elder). There's actually more of them in M14. There's a lot of enchantment hate, but mostly the fact that a creature or an artifact also gets the enchantment type only matters for fetching them with Zur and Idyllic Tutor (or Academy Rector and Enlightened Tutor, except "Yeah, now I can fetch Celestial Archon with Enlightened Tutor in my Legacy deck!", says nobody, ever). Maybe it's time to try again my ridiculous Lost Auramancers/Vampire Hexmage combo.
Re: your token deck, I played tokens in the past, but never BW. And my tokens deck were really committed. Like tokens, tokens, tokens, and then some tokens. And then Hour of Reckoning and Espel Tirel. T-O-K-E-N-S! None of that Soul Sister-ish Auriok Champion nonsense! :P
I think I made the final of Eurodrive! once with a token deck that had a Polymorph/Emrakul package in the sideboard.
I currently have a Esper deck like the second you met. It's more like Gifts Rock turned Esper, actually.
"all the flavors of Wrath possible (Gifts for 1 of each" — Wrath of God, Day of Judgment, Supreme Verdict, and...? Which was the 4th?
"they have 2 Emrakul and a Through the Breach in hand so I keep my Path to Exile mana open" — Uh, why? You can't hit Emrakul with that. :)
If you plan to ramp with Deathrite, you'll need to add another set of fetches and lose the Angels. (And you should lose those Angels regardless. :P). Maybe the best way to go with Orzhov tokens is to fully embrace the midrangeness and add Sorin, and seriously, Elspeth Tirel.
Finally, I'd prefer if you kept the checklands in the list. I like to see all the Modern lands listed in a place with their most recent price, as low as it can be (it doesn't really matter, the thing is knowing what their price is; in fact, knowing that it's low is as useful, if not more). You should add the SHM/EVE filter lands, though. Those are always relevant — and pricey. (By the way, INN isn't the code for Innistrad, it's ISD. Seeing that you use the proper codes in the other cases).
I remember, say, 12-15 years ago, when you would go to a big event and there would be players/merchants with binders of P9. The big prices back then were calculated in a few hundreds of dollar-equivalent (there wasn't even Euro yet!), so you could say, "Okay, I'll use some of my monthly budget for entertainment and buy myself a shiny Mox". You could go to the ATM and take some money for it.
Now that would be like seeing people going around with actual jewels in their suitcases, and you expected to carry that money around or be ready to make such a purchase in a whim. In fact, I remember reading that a real sapphire like the one depicted on Mox Sapphire costs less than a mint beta Mox Sapphire.
By the way, did you notice there are THREE new tribes in Theros? (Counting Nymph as new). I bet very few people noticed the third one, which is a very baffling addition. It'll be a bit laugh in my evaluation article.
Oh, thank you! I should have looked at the "type line" of the pre-6th edition cards (I never do because it usually doesn't say much).
Still doesn't make a lot of sense to revert that back and leave all the others without the Nymph type. Not to mention nobody telling MTGO about that.
I think an example of a card that people just didn't want to sell at a loss was Vindicate, as well as other IPA block stuff before the last batch of IPA nix-tix drafts happened. People seemed willing to continue to tie up their virtual capital in cards that -- no matter the scarcity -- players just didn't want to pay extreme prices for. So they went on selling one or two on occasion at the inflated historical price, rather than dump their stock by pricing it more in accord with the actual demand. When IPA drafts happened, you immediately saw people selling at 50% of previous retail, because that was the only way they could find a buyer.
The duals are a different matter, I think. They weren't artificially kept at a high price, they have organically risen in price due to new sources of demand. People who want to own duals tend to keep them so that they can build decks for that format. Once somebody enters the eternal formats, they will park any duals they acquire in their digital binders, where they will remain until that person quits Magic Online or has a need for quick cash in an emergency.
Despite what I said above about Vindicate, I wouldn't expect a few hoarders to do the same on Power 9. Those IPA cards just had weird history behind them, and there were people who bought in really high. Tying up thousands of dollars by hoarding Power 9, just to trickle a few onto the market occasionally at inflated prices doesn't seem like a good use of one's total assets. That's money you have basically gathering dust when it could be doing more work for you turning other specs into more profits. I know with paper cards that the binder-grinders don't tie up alot of their binder's net worth in Power 9, because there's a much smaller pool of potential buyers, and even at an eternal magic event they would do much better trading if their binder had the equivalent value in revised dual lands.
I still don't think this is the way they would do it. They've spent years working on the ideas and it is apparently something really cool and exciting. I would not classify MED5 or "Classic Masters" as either. (My reasoning on Classic Masters is that the cards they would need/want to introduce would heavily limit the enjoyment of a limited environment)
My only issue with Molten Primordial is the mana cost. 7 mana is a bunch for this deck. It would be a huge beating though, I agree, especially if Aurelia was already out there. You could probably take out Mordant Dragon and put him in there though.
Cloudshift is hilarious, I never considered it like that before. I'm going to have to find a way to put that into a future deck!
It is notable that the dual lands have risen back to where they were pre-me4 in terms of prices. The difference now is availability.
On that note I don't entirely agree with the premise that a market is healthy if it has good supply yet the prices are high. To me that signals that maybe getting a high price is more important than the format being open. Of course magic is for all intents and purposes a "Rich Kid's Game" since the functionally high end cards are inevitably going to also be high priced. However, when the prices choke off access ($40+ duals) despite availability I think that's a sign that the market isn't healthy. Either the market isn't reaching its proper clientele or the prices are in gouging range because no one wants to lose lots of profits by being the first to lower them to "rational" levels. You're the economist and I'm just a lay observer so your opinion may be more right than my own, but this is what seems to me to be happening in M:TGO.
I don't expect this to be any different for the power 9 no matter the starting price. I expect speculators/hoarders to stock up because of their superior buying power on much of the product and then slowly sell off at exorbitant prices.
I would be suprised if power nine arrived alone on MTGO. I do expect them to be accompanied by other vintage staples (a Vintage/Classic Masters if you will). Reprinting the power nine as Mythics and cards such as Lion's Eye Diamond and the Duals as rares would ensure that Black Lotus is more expensive than Bad Black Lotus. I would be suprised if they did this any other way. MED5, Classic Masters, something like that. And it would be awesome. But this year? It sounds a bit like the long-standing promise that Leagues would be coming back in 2011
http://www.silkhookahlounge.com/
Good stuff, I understand you're going purely voltron, but it saddens me that Myr Battlespher is your only token producer. Don't forget that Precursor Golem can turn on metalcraft all by himself as well.
I particularly liked your Clock to Certain Doom countdown. Very fun.
I'm starting it today, should have it finished this week. I wanted to wait until MaRo's articles on cards were up so I didn't make any glaring mistakes and have some direct references. On a plus I hit Heliod's Spear right on!
The problem with blue is that it's not really a control color in Theros. With lack of card draw and a lot of spells being tempo based, blue doesn't really help you play a longer game with black, and it doesn't really have much answers for the gods other than countering them. I think in some form the gods will be played, and mono black doesn't have an answer for the gods other than slamming Gray Merchants before the gods get online. I like starting with B/W. Elspeth is a beast and Heliod (if you play him) can take over long games. Not to mention Whip rebuying Gray Merchant is disgusting.
Thanks, glad you liked it!
Benthic Giant is a sweet one. A 4/5 that can't be dealt with removal is solid.
Soldier tribal support with Evangel would be nuts. Any sort of mass creature buff actually.
I agree, the ordeals can be explosive. In Theros a t1 creature into t2 ordeal is almost unbeatable. Not sure about cube, but really you can't expect the opponent to ALWAYS have removal. Lemme know how it goes!
I'll be ignoring the unplayables next time around. Just borderline, cubeable, and staples.
I checked your cube and it looks pretty sweet. Reminds me of a few cards that I need to try out, like Griffin Guide.
Interesting read. I have been working out which Theros addition to make to my Peasant cube, so it was well timed for me.
You opened my eyes to Benthic Giant, I will be giving him a slot. I also will be trying the Nimbus Naiad, she is a decent flyer, but the cost on the bestow is so pricy, I am not sure if she is worth the slot. We shall see.
Overall white seemed pretty weak for cube additions. Heroic just doesn't cut it cube wise. The only white card I am adding is Evangel of Heliod. My cube has a soldier subtheme in white making him a potential bomb.
You say none of the ordeal are worth it, and you may be right. I am going to try the red one though. I like my red hyper aggressive, and if you don't have an answer to "one drop, ordeal on two and swing" it can just bury you fast. It probably is still not be worth it in a cube with good removal, but I want to give it a try.
Looking forward to seeing the rest of the colors. You are probably right that it is not worth mentioning the unplayables. Most stuff in a set will never see a cube so why bother.
If you are curious about my cube you can see it here http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/2766
Mono-Black certainly looks the strongest upfront. But I wouldn't count out a UB control build nor a base white build either. Omen Speaker seems solid enough and you have Ashiok in UB. In White you've got some very unpleasantly quick weenies, spear of heliod and God's Willing.
However I was interested in seeing if a GBw - reanimation deck was possible, using Ashen Riders, Polukranosusessss, Commune with the Gods, and Rescue form the underworld maybe?
(A bit late, sorry.)
Xenagos is very much from Theros, I'm told he's one of the main characters in the storyline of the novel. He was a Satyr fed up with the "tyranny" of the Gods, and one fateful day his planeswalker spark triggered (don't remember if because of trauma or just naturally), he became a planeswalker, visited other planes, learned things, and came back to Theros to lead the monsters in a revolution against the Gods to overthrow the current pantheon and elevate himself to the divine rank (it's hinted that we may get Xenagos' God card later in the block.) So the human heroes fight for the gods, and the monsters fight for Xenagos. I find it a nice setup because Xenagos is the antagonist here but he's not evil, he wants to take power to change the status quo.
Can't tell if there's a Greek myth that mirrors this story (probably not, seems made up to fit the block's general setup), or a famous "revolutionary" satyr whatsoever. (It'll turn out the main inspiration for him is Castro, maybe :)
Hey when is part two coming!
Like that:
http://www.reddit.com/r/mtgcube/comments/1kyefd/guide_custom_cube_drafts...
First of all, thanks, Gwyned, for this review!
I don't complete agree with you some calls:) Looks like you tend to name "hits" expensive cards with high */*.
Vulpine Goliath - i'm pretty sure any aggro can down you to 3-5 before you take this guy out. And flyers will just seal the deal, as this fox doesn't have reach.
Leonin Snarecaster is nothing more than a White Goblin Shortcutter, a card which has seen virtually no play in Standard Pauper - the reason for this was the existing of BUG flicker, which made almost all aggro decks unplayable. There it doesn't matter if the opponent block 5 damage or eats it, if he plays saruli next turn or flicks the creature, before the blocking step. I think now aggro can change into "you can not block this decks", as we have 3 creatures of this kind: arrester (detain), goblin and this new cat. Add haste to this and it could be dangerous.
Lagonna-Band Elder - I think it's a good card for anchants-based WW or selesnya. 3/2 is a good beater and blocker and 3 lives can give you an edge vs aggro. Definitely not bad in a selesnya-colored hexproof deck along with the centaur healer.
You'll put the filters in? (Mmm... this sounds strange. :)
I actually don't like them much, but they are widely played, I'd say more than the SOM ones.
Elspeth Tirel is possibly one of my Top 3 favorite non-gimmicky planeswalkers (and in general, I think the planeswalkers from SOM block were all great, there's not a single misfire in there.) She can wipe the board the turn after she comes in! I think it's a rare, if not unique, case where the ultimate is the first ability you want to — and can! — use.
I've seen some heated debates regarding Hero of Bladehold vs Elspeth K-E. I like both cards, so I can see the merits of either side. I'd lean towards Elspeth since she can make Champions/Deathrites fly in for damage.
I wanted to give Jubilation a try over the other 4 drops, but I never fought Pod to see if she was worth it or not?
Thanks again for reading and for the positive review!
I do love Promise of Bunrei; I played Ghost Husk A LOT that Standard season. Very fond memories.
We can always hope the next 2 sets provide more power for Enchantments in general?
The 4 Wrath was Damnation. (Which I gave them because at the time it tapped up all of their black mana at the very least.)
Yeah, I'd put in the other Fetches for Deathrite.
I'm always curious if Elspeth Tirel could be in the SB as a life gainer that has added value in other ways? I'm just not at the point, yet, where I want to spend the money to give her a try. (too many other staples go get first!!)
I may wind up keeping the Check lands. I have some new ideas on how I want to handle the lands prices, so survival might be in the cards for those Core lands yet.
Aw, when I read "forgotten Kamigawa card", I hoped it was Promise of Bunrei! :)
I've a lot of good memories with that card. I think might still be relevant. I bought a playset recently, as part of the preparation to Theros, because you never know.
Speaking of which, the idea that Theros was an "enchantment set" in the end has revealed as a bit of a mystification, no? There are things that are ALSO enchantments, but there aren't "enchantments matter" cards (or they're just bland, like Lagonna-Band Elder). There's actually more of them in M14. There's a lot of enchantment hate, but mostly the fact that a creature or an artifact also gets the enchantment type only matters for fetching them with Zur and Idyllic Tutor (or Academy Rector and Enlightened Tutor, except "Yeah, now I can fetch Celestial Archon with Enlightened Tutor in my Legacy deck!", says nobody, ever). Maybe it's time to try again my ridiculous Lost Auramancers/Vampire Hexmage combo.
Re: your token deck, I played tokens in the past, but never BW. And my tokens deck were really committed. Like tokens, tokens, tokens, and then some tokens. And then Hour of Reckoning and Espel Tirel. T-O-K-E-N-S! None of that Soul Sister-ish Auriok Champion nonsense! :P
I think I made the final of Eurodrive! once with a token deck that had a Polymorph/Emrakul package in the sideboard.
I currently have a Esper deck like the second you met. It's more like Gifts Rock turned Esper, actually.
"all the flavors of Wrath possible (Gifts for 1 of each" — Wrath of God, Day of Judgment, Supreme Verdict, and...? Which was the 4th?
"they have 2 Emrakul and a Through the Breach in hand so I keep my Path to Exile mana open" — Uh, why? You can't hit Emrakul with that. :)
If you plan to ramp with Deathrite, you'll need to add another set of fetches and lose the Angels. (And you should lose those Angels regardless. :P). Maybe the best way to go with Orzhov tokens is to fully embrace the midrangeness and add Sorin, and seriously, Elspeth Tirel.
Finally, I'd prefer if you kept the checklands in the list. I like to see all the Modern lands listed in a place with their most recent price, as low as it can be (it doesn't really matter, the thing is knowing what their price is; in fact, knowing that it's low is as useful, if not more). You should add the SHM/EVE filter lands, though. Those are always relevant — and pricey. (By the way, INN isn't the code for Innistrad, it's ISD. Seeing that you use the proper codes in the other cases).
I remember, say, 12-15 years ago, when you would go to a big event and there would be players/merchants with binders of P9. The big prices back then were calculated in a few hundreds of dollar-equivalent (there wasn't even Euro yet!), so you could say, "Okay, I'll use some of my monthly budget for entertainment and buy myself a shiny Mox". You could go to the ATM and take some money for it.
Now that would be like seeing people going around with actual jewels in their suitcases, and you expected to carry that money around or be ready to make such a purchase in a whim. In fact, I remember reading that a real sapphire like the one depicted on Mox Sapphire costs less than a mint beta Mox Sapphire.
What's fun is that actually ONLY people on MTGO (and probably only tribal players) will ever realize or care about that change. :)
By the way, did you notice there are THREE new tribes in Theros? (Counting Nymph as new). I bet very few people noticed the third one, which is a very baffling addition. It'll be a bit laugh in my evaluation article.
MTGO is our redheaded step child. We like to treat it like mushrooms.
Oh, thank you! I should have looked at the "type line" of the pre-6th edition cards (I never do because it usually doesn't say much).
Still doesn't make a lot of sense to revert that back and leave all the others without the Nymph type. Not to mention nobody telling MTGO about that.
I think an example of a card that people just didn't want to sell at a loss was Vindicate, as well as other IPA block stuff before the last batch of IPA nix-tix drafts happened. People seemed willing to continue to tie up their virtual capital in cards that -- no matter the scarcity -- players just didn't want to pay extreme prices for. So they went on selling one or two on occasion at the inflated historical price, rather than dump their stock by pricing it more in accord with the actual demand. When IPA drafts happened, you immediately saw people selling at 50% of previous retail, because that was the only way they could find a buyer.
The duals are a different matter, I think. They weren't artificially kept at a high price, they have organically risen in price due to new sources of demand. People who want to own duals tend to keep them so that they can build decks for that format. Once somebody enters the eternal formats, they will park any duals they acquire in their digital binders, where they will remain until that person quits Magic Online or has a need for quick cash in an emergency.
Despite what I said above about Vindicate, I wouldn't expect a few hoarders to do the same on Power 9. Those IPA cards just had weird history behind them, and there were people who bought in really high. Tying up thousands of dollars by hoarding Power 9, just to trickle a few onto the market occasionally at inflated prices doesn't seem like a good use of one's total assets. That's money you have basically gathering dust when it could be doing more work for you turning other specs into more profits. I know with paper cards that the binder-grinders don't tie up alot of their binder's net worth in Power 9, because there's a much smaller pool of potential buyers, and even at an eternal magic event they would do much better trading if their binder had the equivalent value in revised dual lands.
I still don't think this is the way they would do it. They've spent years working on the ideas and it is apparently something really cool and exciting. I would not classify MED5 or "Classic Masters" as either. (My reasoning on Classic Masters is that the cards they would need/want to introduce would heavily limit the enjoyment of a limited environment)
Thanks guys. I appreciate the feedback.
My only issue with Molten Primordial is the mana cost. 7 mana is a bunch for this deck. It would be a huge beating though, I agree, especially if Aurelia was already out there. You could probably take out Mordant Dragon and put him in there though.
Cloudshift is hilarious, I never considered it like that before. I'm going to have to find a way to put that into a future deck!
It is notable that the dual lands have risen back to where they were pre-me4 in terms of prices. The difference now is availability.
On that note I don't entirely agree with the premise that a market is healthy if it has good supply yet the prices are high. To me that signals that maybe getting a high price is more important than the format being open. Of course magic is for all intents and purposes a "Rich Kid's Game" since the functionally high end cards are inevitably going to also be high priced. However, when the prices choke off access ($40+ duals) despite availability I think that's a sign that the market isn't healthy. Either the market isn't reaching its proper clientele or the prices are in gouging range because no one wants to lose lots of profits by being the first to lower them to "rational" levels. You're the economist and I'm just a lay observer so your opinion may be more right than my own, but this is what seems to me to be happening in M:TGO.
I don't expect this to be any different for the power 9 no matter the starting price. I expect speculators/hoarders to stock up because of their superior buying power on much of the product and then slowly sell off at exorbitant prices.
I would be suprised if power nine arrived alone on MTGO. I do expect them to be accompanied by other vintage staples (a Vintage/Classic Masters if you will). Reprinting the power nine as Mythics and cards such as Lion's Eye Diamond and the Duals as rares would ensure that Black Lotus is more expensive than Bad Black Lotus. I would be suprised if they did this any other way. MED5, Classic Masters, something like that. And it would be awesome. But this year? It sounds a bit like the long-standing promise that Leagues would be coming back in 2011