With Whip decks holding down the fort as one of the core pillars of the 2014-2015 winter Standard season, it’s no surprise that this central feature of the recursive mid-range decks has been sliding up. Given that the card was available for as little as $1.25 in late summer 2014, there was some solid profit potential to be realized here if you pushed your chips in on this powerful card ahead of the curve. With relatively little Theros being opened these days, it could perhaps top out at $7-8 in a best case scenario, but I’d be happy to get out now with the inevitable rotation decline on the horizon for early summer.
We’re not yet at peak supply yet for Khans of Tarkir staples, as the set is going to be drafted alongside Fate Reforged for a couple of months before being left behind in the wake of Dragons of Tarkir and Modern Masters (2015 Edition). As such, buying in now on this card may not be ideal, since a early summer lull is likely unless the graveyard decks keep putting up top table performances. That being said, I love the card in both foil and non-foil for the long term as it’s a great casual/EDH card with a unique effect and a palatable casting cost. I’ve been picking up quite a few copies in the $3 range along the way, looking to double up within the year on half the stock and hold the rest long term.
If Standard has proven to have a color combination of near infinite variation this fall and winter, it must be red, white and blue. Between the token, tempo and Jeskai Ascendancy combo variants, this oft-reprinted pain land has been in high demand and is on track to carry on the fine tradition of blue/red dual lands leading the pack on price. If you picked up copies last summer in the $3-4 range, now is a fine time to be trading out or selling off, as they are unlikely to move much higher before rotation.
Don’t be fooled by the short-term variability. As a confirmed reprint for Modern Masters (2015 Edition), Emrakul should have nowhere to go but down. You’d be wise to exit on any copies you’re holding while you can.
Format(s): Modern/Legacy/Casual/EDH
Verdict: Sell
5. Lilianna Vess (M15, Mythic): $7.12 to $7.69 (+8%)
The lesser Lilianna is seeing occasional play out of Abzan mid-range decks as a 1-2 of aimed at generating additional card advantadge in the grindy world of mid-range deck on deck violence. She could top $8, but if you got in last summer around $4, or had older copies sitting around, go ahead and get out now while the getting is good since she’s unlikely to increase her presence in the metagame any further before rotating out again next fall and her multiple printings and midling power level make her a poor long term target.
Now normally Future Sight rares are a great place to go looking for cards that could explode in price, but the presence of Chromatic Lantern in the EDH scene and high chance of a further reprint of this lesser card put non-foil copies of Relic far down the list of interesting pickups. The recent downswing doesn’t seem to have a definite source, but I’d stay away just the same.
Format(s): EDH/Casual
Verdict: Hold
2. Zurgo Helmsmasher (Khans of Tarkir, Mythic): $1.19 to $1.04 (-13%)
While his fellow Khan Narset is looking pretty tasty right about now, Zurgo isn’t getting enough love from any format to even consider jumping in. Just accept that he’s going to be hanging out in bulk bins and move on.
Format(s): Um, none.
Verdict: Sell/Trade
3. Omniscience (M13, Mythic): $10.75 to $9.50 (-12%)
This card on the other hand is chock full of broken potential and is really just waiting on a Top 8 showing or two to shift into high gear. It also needs to not see a reprint any time soon, but that’s looking unlikely given that notable reprints are largely about keeping Modern affordable or filling gaps in Standard at present and this card fills neither role. Because it’s already hovering around $10, it’s the kind of card I’m not into hunting until I see it do something drastic on camera, but be ready to pull the trigger fast if that ever happens.
If you’ve been holding copies of Sarkhan since the September 2014 pre-order period, you’ve already gone on quite the ride, with copies peaking in the mid $30’s before steadily declining to half that level due to softening Standard play and literal tons of product being opened. That being said, I’ve been starting to acquire copies under $13 where I can since I fully expect him to have a 2nd coming either due to dragon specific cards this spring or general scarcity next fall. It’s not a spec I plan to go really deep on, but I’ve got a few sets waiting for the bounce.
Verdict: Buy/Trade
5. Fulminator Mage (Shadowmoor, Rare) $41.12 to $38.86 (-5%)
Here’s another card waiting for an excuse to climb a bit more, likely in the form of the banning of treasure cruise and the general rebounding of the value of Jund strategies in Modern. This kind of land destruction isn’t something WOTC seems eager to reprint, but he could still show up in MM2 this summer and wreck all the lovely gains he’s made over the last few years up from as low as $6 in early 2013. If you don’t need your extras, leave some potential and risk on the table and reap the rewards of a sweet spec.
Verdict: Sell/Trade
Quick Hits:
January 19th, 2015 is the next Banned & Restricted list announcement and banning of any or all of the following could make big waves and open up new specs: Treasure Cruise, Dig Through Time, Jeskai Ascendancy, Birthing Pod. Getting rid of all of the above in Modern opens up the format a ton, and it’s possible Cruise gets the axe as far back as Legacy. I don’t want to be caught holding many copies of that card in foil, so I’ve been selling out, but the rest I’ve decided to risk. Make your call and get ready for the fallout.
Likely MM2 reprints aren’t falling nearly as fast as they should be and I think too many people are underestimating the print run this time around. Get out while you can…these aren’t cards you want to be holding come June.
James Chillcott is the CEO of ShelfLife.net, The Future of Collecting, Senior Partner at Advoca, a designer, adventurer, toy fanatic and an avid Magic player and collector since 1994.
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Welcome to the new year! This year, we’re getting a new Modern Masters, the death of Core Sets, and a faster, more frequent rotation out of Standard. It promises to be a heck of a year, and so I’ve made a few promises to myself. Perhaps some of them will resonate with you.
#1: Play more Magic
I know it seems like a simplistic goal, considering how much I love this game, but due to moving and babies and lots of other little things, I didn’t play nearly as much Magic as I wanted in 2014. I’d like to attend a couple of big events and get to FNM at least once a month, and attend my first Prerelease since Gatecrash!
#2: Don’t cash out this year
At least once in 2012, 2013, and 2014 I sold big chunks of cards for big real-life expenses. Car repairs, moving money, and to buy a new Tempurpedic bed. (I cannot recommend this bed strongly enough!) Mostly, that came out of my EDH decks, as I’ve downsized to six Commander decks, from my maximum of 15 a few years ago.
I’ve never put a lot of capital into my collection, but taking value out this way, several times in a row, has really lowered the value of the things I have for trade. I don’t regret the loss, as I got what I needed when I needed it, but I would like to spend some time increasing the value without taking any out.
#3: Reorganize binders
Right now, I have four binders of varying sizes: I have my main trade binder, a second one with all my signed cards and speculative cards, a third which contains only cards I’ve taken out of Commander decks, and a fourth that is a Conspiracy foil set-in-progress.
I will trade out of the second and third, but only when there’s something I really want. The problem is that I’ve taken so much out of the first binder, so I often end up showing these other two. I need to go through and classify things better.
#4: Introduce a new player
This is a goal all of us should have. Introduce someone to Magic. It can be in any format, any method. Go slow, and remember that this is a very complex game. Magic’s player base has grown an incredible amount these few years, and if you get the chance, you should bring someone new into the fold.
It also counts if you bring someone back into the game. Remember, Magic used to be big enough that in 1997, the World Championships were televised! Lots of people used to play, and gave it up. Perhaps you’ll get someone back into the game that has some unsorted Alpha laying around, and you’ll help them get a lot of value!
#5: Watch more Magic
I love watching Twitch’s stream, be it the official Magic channel or SCGLive or anything live. I especially love coverage of high-level drafting, but somehow, I’m addicted to watching streams or recordings. The archives of video coverage are enough to get me lost for hours and hours, unless it’s hours and hours of Whip of Erebos mirror matches. Ugh.
Skipping shuffling/sideboarding time is the best argument for watching archives and not the live stream. But I’ll watch anyway!
#6: Continue not playing MTGO
I kicked the habit several years ago and I’m not going to get drawn back in until the program is worth my time. Is it a condemnation of MTGO or praise of SCGLive that I’d so much rather watch the stream than play online?
My Kaalia of the Vast Commander deck has a lot of foreign foil Angels. I’ve got foil Japanese Avacyn, foil French Angel of Despair, foil Italian Kokusho, the Evening Star, and so on. There’s a foil German Akroma, Angel of Wrath that I’ve had my eye on for a while and I really want it! So I’m resolving to buy it this year. Or just upgrade my Portuguese into a foil Portuguese.
On a similar note, I traded for a white-bordered German Plateau for the same deck, and now I need a Badlands and a Scrubland to match. Sure, this is a lofty goal, needing such a specific edition when I already have duals, but everyone needs a goal to aspire to!
#8: Use eBay more
I have had excellent luck in the past, buying single on eBay and then trading them for full retail value, when I picked the card up for significantly less. In this way, I turned one spare Plateau into a Verdant Catacombs and a pair of Cavern of Souls. Buying cards that are expressly for your trade binder is an excellent way to infuse value into your binder, as long as you are upfront about the premium for trading Legacy cards to get Standard cards.
Put another way: I buy a Vindicate on eBay for $12 + $2 shipping. I would feel comfortable asking for a pair of Bloodstained Mire and a Siege Rhino for it. Thus I’ve added $27 in value to my binder for about half that in cash. Winner!
And oh goodness…Vindicate in French is ‘Justification’…I might have a new resolution!
There are a few topics I would like to write about, but neither had sufficient fodder to be expanded into a full-fledged article. So I combined them together into one article, a sort of holiday hodgepodge of an article. The first part deals with the shifting paradigm in Modern speculation. The second discusses the first trickle of spoilers in the Fate Reforged spoiler season.
Modern Paradigm
Modern used to be a veritable speculator’s heaven. It was a relatively new format with plenty of unexplored deckbuilding space. Breakout cards spiked overnight by order of magnitudes when they received coverage during a major event. Bulk and near-bulk rares shot up to insane heights when a home was found for those once unloved pieces of cardboard wasting away in bulk bins. Modern staples resembled blue chip shares. However, that era is coming to an end.
Wizards stated over and over again that they are serious about supporting Modern as a Pro Tour format. Modern was a non-rotating format unshackled by the reserve list. We passed the era when the power level of the format was being tuned by frequent bannings, and the format has since evolved a distinctively unique flavor – midrange value grinds with a splash of combo – and a plethora of viable tier one decks in the format at any one time. Wizards is currently in the stage of keeping Modern’s entry barrier sufficiently affordable to be inclusive of the majority of the playerbase, while at the same time remain a premier non-rotating format.
From the reprint of in-demand, expensive staples like Remand and Wurmcoil Engine in supplementary products like Duel Decks and Commander decks to reprinting Thoughtseize and fetchlands in normal sets, Wizards made it abundantly clear that they are taking their promise to ensure that Modern staples remain affordable seriously. While Wizards’ dedication is great for the game and playerbase overall, it increased the risk for Magic financiers invested or planning to invest in Modern staples.
I would not have it any other way: I am a player first, a financier second. I got into Magic finance because Magic is an expensive habit. A little speculation here and there helped eased the financial pressure of grinding competitive Magic. If Wizards goes gung-ho in reprinting Modern staples, that negates some of the cost associated with staying at the forefront of competitive Magic. Every wave of reprints help me get one step closer to completing my gauntlet of tier one Modern decks.
That does not mean I am jumping overboard from the invest-in-Modern ship. I still have a decent amount of vested interest in terms of Modern investment. That just means I have to change my outlook towards investing in Modern cards to fit the new paradigm. Adapt or die.
I. Shorter Hold Time
Thee Modern staples I bought at the inception of the format in 2011 just kept on going up and up. Those $8 Vendilion Cliques I bought on eBay doubled to $20, $40 and then $80. I bought my fourth non-foil Cryptic Command at $35 in January 2014 because I needed it for the Modern side event at Grand Prix Kuala Lumpur. $35 must be the ceiling for a Modern staple reprinted in Modern Masters as a rare, I consoled myself as I mentally punched myself for not completing my non-foil playset back when it was a $15 card. Cryptic Command is now at $60. Don’t even get me talking about the Liliana of the Veils and Scalding Tarns.
Most of my Modern investments remained with me today as I kept on convincing myself that they have more room to grow. The fact that my holdings got more expensive after Modern Masters emboldened the greedy me. My Modern stakes were invincible.
It’s got to keep going up. From Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby.
My approach to Modern speculation was untethered from the realities of Magic finance and investment in general. Even the mighty crude oil eventually fell in price. Earlier this year my Remands took a hit when it was reprinted in Jace vs. Vraska. Fine, Remand was still a double-digit uncommon and I dug them out from my bulk box anyway. But I still held on to them, hoping that they will return to their near-$20 price.
Late last year Birthing Pod was hovering around $6 – $8. I bought my second playset of Birthing Pods. And traded for a few more. In the post-Bloodbraid Elf era of Modern, Pod decks took down more Grand Prix than every other archetype in Modern. Surely $6 – $8 was way too low for the namesake piece of Pod decks. I was right. Birthing Pod spiked to $18 – $19 spring this year. Yet I was reluctant to liquidate my Birthing Pod holdings. Phyrexian mana cards must surely be hard to reprint. I am sure Birthing Pod has more room to grow as the centerpiece of one of the most important archetype in Modern! I told myself that even though I knew they were printed in the New Phyrexia event deck. The spike did not last long; Birthing Pod dropped to $10 over the summer and with Modern Masters 2015 coming up, I doubt Birthing Pod will be able to break $15 again. Let alone the lofty heights I had hoped for previously.
Modern is no longer a hold and wait game. If you are interested to invest in Modern staples, you must be willing to liquidate them rather than holding onto them like blue chip stocks. Some time ago, Corbin Hosler wrote about liquidating his fetchlands when the blue ones hit $35. When Scalding Tarns broke $100 during spring this year, I thought to myself Corbin could’ve made so much more had he held them just for another year. Every time I considered liquidating my Modern holdings that are already in the profit, I hark back to Corbin’s article and told myself to wait just a little bit more.
Gone are those days when we laughed at the idea of predicting a ceiling for Modern staples. Today, as I write this, I looked back at Corbin’s article as a good paradigm to follow for investing in Modern staples: liquidate once you have made your profit.
Be willing to liquidate your holdings that have grown into profit instead of waiting and hoping for another spike. It took a while for Wizards to go full steam ahead with their promise on reprinting Modern staples due to their multi-year-long development cycle and a conservative approach to prevent Chronicles 2.0, but Wizards seem to have grasped the pace for Modern reprints now. This year alone saw Modern staples like Wurmcoil Engine, Remand, Chord of Calling, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and fetchlands fall in price.
In Bayesian terms, it is better to liquidate at 130% profit rather than stake out for a 200% profit and risk making a loss instead in the current climate of Modern reprints. As Corbin said, leave the last 10% to others. Expanding on that for contemporary Modern speculation, I would say you have to be willing to even leave the next 20% – 30%.
Set a reasonable exit price for your Modern speculations and adjust existing exit targets. I am no longer holding onto my Snapcaster Mages until they hit Dark Confidant price; I am happy to liquidate them once they hit $50 and take home the $30 in profit rather than risk a reprint while I am gunning for a $60 paycheck.
II. Every Product Spoiler is Relevant.
I used to ignore supplementary product spoilers as they were not relevant to the competitive metagame. I prefer to discover those items at my own pace like shuffling up freshly-unboxed Commander decks with no knowledge of the decklist and finding out myself the surprises R & D had in store for me as I play that deck. It was a pleasant surprise to discover the dragons subtheme in the Daretti Commander deck as I drew dragon after dragon.
Wizards is now willing to reprint expensive Modern mythics in supplementary products like Wurmcoil Engine in the red Commander 2014 deck, Built from Scratch. Keep a close finger on the pulse for Modern reprints.
III. Hit it Low
Look for obviously underpriced Modern staples rather than buying already expensive Modern staples and hope for the next bump. It is harder to predict if another bump would happen with Wizards churning out so many reprints. The increased risk is not worth it.
Hunt for Modern cards no one is looking at because it is not seeing much playing at the moment or a recent reprint crashed its price. $3.58 Chord of Calling is a good example. You are unlikely to regret buying a Modern staple at this price.
That Time of the Year
One nice thing about being in charge of the column that goes up slightly after midnight on Tuesday is getting to write about the spoilers right away.
The first spoiler that manifested itself was:
Whisperwood Elemental by Raymond Swanland.
Whisperwood Elemental was Mark Rosewater’s preview card on the first day of spoiler season. When I first read through the essay of a card, I was underwhelmed. Mark Rosewater’s spoilers were usually the cream of the crop for the set, the marquee cards of the block designed to whet our appetites and rev up the engines of the hype train. A five mana for 4/4 with no enter the battlefield ability felt a little disappointing.
While Whisperwood Elemental’s triggered-at-your-end-step ability may not always net you the extra value with Hero’s Downfall, Murderous Cut, and Stoke the Flames being popular removals in the format, Whisperwood Elemental rewards you with a snowballing board state if it is left unanswered. Sticking a Whisperwood Elemental on board for a few turns might just put you too far ahead for your opponent to catch up, especially with its second clause that acts as an insurance against board wipes. Financially, I am not (yet) sold on Whisperwood Elemental as it feels fragile in the current state of Standard. It has the making of an expensive rare, but I think Whisperwood Elemental might be more Duskmantle Seer than Wingmate Roc. Okay, maybe better than Duskmantle Seer, but definitely not as good as Wingmate Roc.
The Storm’s Fury is not that high up on the Storm scale.
Ah dragons. I missed them. Competitively costed? Check. Solid stats? Check. @rezaaba reminded me during our usual flurry of spoiler season discussion that Kolaghan is actually a 5/5 when attacking. I am not sure how relevant Kolaghan’s anthem trigger would be at five mana: Kolaghan could see play as a top-of-the-curve alpha striker in aggressive RB shells. Or perhaps a midrangey Mardu deck that relies on token-makers to create an overwhelming number of creatures to make Kolaghan’s anthem worth the five mana you tap for it. Note that Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker, another key-piece of Mardu midrange tokens, triggers Kolaghan’s anthem too.
Would Kolaghan be the Thundermaw Hellkite to the contemporary Thragtusk, Siege Rhino? I highly doubt so. The prevalence of reanimator strategies in the current Standard metagame is a twofold obstacle for Kolaghan. The amount of life gained by reanimator decks over the course of a game is too much for aggressive decks to handle, even if they have access to top of the curve beaters like Kolaghan. Second, the number of 1/1 deathtouch bees in the meta is too damn high. Slamming hasty five mana fliers is not something you want to be doing unless its called Thundermaw Hellkite.
I am happy to see a new, potentially competitive dragon being printed, but I doubt its financial potential. Even if Kolaghan sees play, small set rares have a low ceiling unless it is a ubiquitous linchpin of the format. Kolaghan is not a card I am inclined to preorder.
Manifest Destiny
I stole that pun off Twitter.
I guess it’s too much to ask for a card to be called “Manifest Destiny”, so maybe a deck can be called that. #MTGFRF
At first glance, manifest seemed like an underwhelming mechanic designed with limited in mind. For once I was actually excited for limited. Morph is already pretty fun by itself and manifest is going to push limited dynamics to a whole new level. Playing around face-down cards just got a whole lot more complicated (and fun)!
You could now legally have a face-down ‘morphed’ land.
Upon closer inspection, manifest is a form of card advantage. It takes a card from the top of your library and turns it into a 2/2 creature, regardless of the card type. That extra land on top of your library could be conscripted to bolster your board presence, saving you one dead draw phase. Manifesting a creature from the top of your library is sort of like drawing it, except you do not use up your draw phase.
But enough about strategy, I am writing about Magic finance and there would be plenty of discussion regarding the pros and cons of manifest by other more esteemed Magic strategy writers. What I am concerned about is the financial impact of the mechanic on existing cards, and a card that stands to abuse the manifest mechanic in Standard is no other than:
The most fearsome hydra in the hood, it is always followed by a posse of 1/1 hydra wannabes.
Manifesting a Hooded Hydra allows you to turn it face up for just GG to become a 5/5 creature that leaves behind five snake tokens. That is a trip to valueland.
Of course that scenario assumes that Hooded Hydra is on the top of your library when the manifest trigger resolves. Working with the manifest cards spoiled so far, we can assume that manifest will draw from the top card of your library. Barring convoluted ways to get Hooded Hydra onto the top of your library (thereby negating the advantage from manifesting it) your best shot at manifesting a Hooded Hydra would be to run four copies of it and/or manipulate the top of your library with Courser of Kruphix and scry.
I am not saying that Hooded Hydra will shine with the new manifest mechanic. It just has a better chance of finding a home. Hooded Hydra is a card to keep an eye on as the spoilers are rolled out within the next few weeks. If Fate Reforged grants enough tools to build decks revolving around the manifest mechanic, getting in on Hooded Hydra at under $2 would have a nice payoff as it is one of the prime candidates to be a four-of in manifest decks.
Another card that works well with manifest is Ashcloud Phoenix, which @rezaaba pointed out during our discussion. You get to unmorph the Phoenix at two mana less than its morph cost and still reap the benefits of turning it face up. Ashcloud Phoenix already proved to be a solid, difficult-to-remove card even at a morph cost of six; manifest decks would be inclined to run multiple copies of Ashcloud Phoenix shall those decks exist. Do not buy Ashcloud Phoenix right now, its current price of $4.33 is not a great buy-in. Keep an eye on upcoming spoilers for manifest enablers and just trade for your Phoenices at the moment.
It might be an over-used trope, but since this is the day after a major holiday, I thought I’d present my year in review, of the good and the bad.
Naughty : Everything MTGO
Sad but true that this should be a flagship. Duels of the Planeswalkers, as a watered-down version of Magic, is a lot of fun to play! Imagine you’re a new player, you’re good enough at Duels and you’re ready for ‘the real thing’ only to find out that it’s buggy, slow, non-intuitive, and ugly.
It’s been this way for quite some time, which is the worst part. I’ll give you that it is more stable than when I played in the long-ago days of Lorwyn and Shadowmoor, but there’s still a legion of other things that need to be addressed. The problem is not with the game: We have several years of consecutive, record-breaking growth. The online version should be able to offer the gameplay and strategy elements of the game, while in-person play adds a social context.
Nice: End of Core Sets
I could not be happier about this change. It’s true that the summer sets offered a change of pace (notably, M14’s focus on Opportunity after the blistering speed of RTR and Gatecrash) but there was a sacrifice of story and a loss of continuity.
Core Sets did offer the chance to return to some fun mechanics (Bloodthirst, Convoke, etc.) but that’s a goal that will be easier to accomplish in an independent world. I’m not worried about the frequency of reprints.
Naughty: Born of the Gods
It didn’t add much and took a lot away. It offered some interesting and fun cards, but it was just not the right fit for anything. Inspired turned out to be difficult to use and not often worth the payoff. Tribute gave your opponent all the power, and let them choose what they could deal with. Luckily, Wizards recognizes this issue and won’t have to deal with three-set blocks anymore.
Nice: Reprints Aplenty
We are in an era where only the Reserved List is safe. Putting the Onslaught fetches into a big fall set was an awesome move, making those lands Modern-legal AND knocking those prices down into easier realms.
The effect on Zendikar lands is noticeable too: We’re not asking “Will they?” but instead “When will they?” reprint these lands. This is going to be their policy going forward, especially with regard to lands. If you are expecting your Tarmogoyfs to hold their $200 tag, I don’t think that will be the case forever. Wizards will continue to judiciously reprint cards, especially Modern-legal ones.
I have enjoyed the effect of a Core Set reprint on Commander cards, especially Chord of Calling and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. Conspiracy, Commander, Duel Decks, PTQ-only foils, new judge foils…we’ve got a lot of ways to get extra copies of a card into circulation.
Wizards now has two cases of reprint-only sets: Chronicles and Modern Masters 1. By modern standards, Chronicles had a tiny print run and the cards looked noticeably different than their originals. If that happened today, I don’t think the reprinted cards would take much of a hit, especially with white borders!
Naughty: Cheaters
Jared Boettcher. Trevor Humphries. Alex Bertoncini.
Three very successful players. One Rookie of the Year. One winner of more than $20,000 in the past year. One ‘rehabilitated’ cheater. All banned for at least three years for having the gall to cheat on camera.
Lots of words have been written about the awful effect a cheater can have on a game, but this bears repeating: You have to have enormous confidence in your trick to try it on camera. Professional magicians can get caught by slo-mo cameras. Your minor-league shuffling trick will get caught.
Nice: Getting them!
As a community, there’s issues we have to deal with, and our response can be lacking. Luckily, cheating is a very galvanizing topic, and with high-definition footage available on YouTube, it can be parsed into frame-by-frame GIF files for endless scrutinization.
We did good, by noticing it, reporting it, and letting the DCI take care of things. We will also be on the lookout for anyone who shuffles our deck differently from how they shuffle their own. It sucks that we have to, but these cheaters only got to be on camera by winning lots of not-on-camera matches.
Naughty: the prize wall with Cascade Games
This was a feature of GP Los Angeles and apparently will be present at every Cascade Games event, including the upcoming GP Vegas for Modern Masters 2015. I don’t mind having something to work for, a chance to accumulate prize points and redeem them for sweet Magic things or just a ton of packs.
My issue is putting side drafts at a GP up to $20. Sure, it’s nice to get 3rd or 4th and have 50 tickets which can get you five packs of Khans, but at $20 you’re going to be drafting less. Offering these drafts for $20 or the simple drafts for $10 is a way to let us decide how much to spend.
Nice: SCG’s $10 drafts
Star City Games may have high prices on singles, but this is my favorite part of an Open coming to town. I can draft and draft and draft, and focus on getting better at the format. After a few drafts in a row this way, you’ll have mastery of the combat tricks at least, and likely many of the archetypes.
Plus, drafts at $10 is less than MSRP for packs, and that always gets me happy. It’s not Buy-One-Get-One good but it’s still something to be a bit thankful for.
Naughty: $10 MM 2015!
Good grief, $10 per pack? Is this just a straight-up cash grab from Wizards? What could they do to these packs to justify it? Guaranteed foils were worth $7. Are we getting double rares? I don’t think we’ll get much more, but the card choice will likely determine the worth involved.
My favorite piece of speculation is that there will be a foil token in every pack!
Nice: Worldwide Distribution of MM 2015
There will be three Grands Prix held at the same time, all the same format: Modern Masters 2015 Sealed Deck. This is unprecedented, and is done to show the demand for the format. Hopefully, a larger distribution means that I’ll get to do more than the one MM draft I did last time.
There will be three languages available as well, a change from last time and adding another chance to make your Commander deck that next level of unique.
Join me next week as I make some resolutions for the new year!
MAGIC: THE GATHERING FINANCE ARTICLES AND COMMUNITY
