Source
r/freemagic•
campee

Richard Garfield's thoughts on $90 collector boosters.. from 1994

GENERAL

"One of the major battles that Magic fought was to make it perceived principally as a game and secondarily as a collectable. Good games last forever—collectables come and go.

This was not merely theoretical speculation—Magic’s immense success as a collectable was severely threatening the entire game. Booster packs intended to be sold at a few bucks were marked up to 20 dollars in some places as soon as they hit the shelves. While many people view this time as the golden age of Magic the designers knew that it was the death of the game in the long run."

Posted May 29, 2020, 7:19 PM UTC

14948
SupervyxenSENATOR•

Garfield also said he doesn't mind if special, collector versions of cards are exorbitantly expensive, as long as regular prints of the same cards are readily available for the people who want to play them.

49
Sermoln•

This is my biggest problem w the set. It’s supposedly designed for me: a new player who would be happy to get his hands on these old, strong cards. And it could turn out to be a great draft format! But the draft boosters are so expensive. Not the collectors boosters or elite Timmy box edition. And honestly I would still shill out for drafts and maybe even a box if the set turns out good. But I don’t know if my LGS is going to be able to convince people to spend that much every week.

20
ReMeDyIIISHAMAN•

In WotC's ivory tower, they want to milk the reprint equity as much as possible, and to do that they want the sealed product the cards are contained in to be expensive. This way, they can do multiple expensive sets to slowly trickle in the card supply to buyers, as opposed to one big cheap set that tanks the reprint equity entirely. Granted, there'd be a lot more buyers for a cheaper set, and WotC would make a lot of money based on volume of buyers, but WotC is heavily valuing that reprint equity above all else.

8
Bithlord•

The key point there being readily available.

2
Lunarskies92•

This began happening as soon as Masters sets began. The MSRP for Modern Masters was like 7 dollars a pack. Apart from a local retailer that always sells packs dirt cheap (and only ever had MM on day one due to this fact) every other seller in the area was selling packs for 12-15. I've been complaining about Masters Sets since they began because they alienate a large portion of players. Sadly, WotC only saw dollar signs.

38
jparham77NEW SPARK•

Because this will always be a RICHARD GARFIELD GAME.

21
Helicon_AmateurMANCHILD•

Obligatory.

Chinaman make da fakes.

You like you buy.

17
taw•

There's really not enough market for this. It's huge effort to make quality fakes, and selling them as singles on ebay how many can you really push?

It's cute that they're trying, but so far they're not succeeding. And new cards with hologram are even harder to fake.

-1†
khakislurry•

Some of the fakes are quite convincing. Behind a matte sleeve I would bet that you could play a GP without a second glance.

3
itsmauitimeGENERAL•

I bought an Ashnod's at an event and didn't realize it was fake until I felt the card in my boredom weeks later.

3
CardAddictsWARLOCK•

Was it an Antiquities print? I can't find anything right off hand, but that set does have some "glossier" printings. I have several cards from the set that are not worth counterfeiting and they have that same glossy feel.

The only fool proof test really is the green dot test. If it passes that, you're gravy.

https://www.detecting-the-fakes.com/checking-details/green-dot-check/

2
taw•

A fake good enough to play Commander at FNM sleeved, but which would get you DCI-banned if a judge does a deck check on GP isn't really all that useful.

0
[deleted]•

[deleted]

2
Helicon_AmateurMANCHILD•

You have no idea what you're talking about

3
taw•

If fakes were good and possible to distribute, prices of reserve list cards would have dropped significantly by now.

It really wouldn't take much to print more rares than Wizards did in ABUR, and we'd see that from prices.

-1
Helicon_AmateurMANCHILD•

1.) Fakes are good enough. You don't know where to get them. Most people don't attempt to because the thought doesn't cross their mind or they've been convinced it is morally wrong to play with proxies.

2.) I'm not interested in selling them for profit, only to play MTG.

EDH/Commander is now driving the price increase of several cards that previously saw no play.

The people who want real cards are the reason prices inflate. If more people realized there is nothing wrong with playing with proxies and real cards weren't a requirement, prices would reduce on most reserve list cards.

4
[deleted]•

[deleted]

3
[deleted]•

[deleted]

3
chaoticbearSOOTHSAYER•

Just don't buy them. The VIP boosters aren't a necessary part of the game. Enjoy the price drops on the reprints and buy singles.

I may buy one as a lottery ticket for entertainment value, kind of like how I never expect to leave a casino with any of the money I took to gamble with.

12
SodaGamesNEW SPARK•

Just don’t buy them... ...I might buy them Lmao

25
chaoticbearSOOTHSAYER•

Haha - I plan to get a box or two of the regular boosters, but don't roll deep enough for a "case" of these.

-2
campeeOP•

This will be the first masters set that I'll be completely skipping. I'm a bay area software engineer and a degenerate gambler who loves cracking packs and even I'm saying "enough is enough" with this release.

8
chaoticbearSOOTHSAYER•

The base EV isn't any worse than other sets - it's like cracking a whole Standard box at once, best case I hit a chase rare, worst case I stick $40 worth of stuff into the trade binder. Either way I'm not stuck with 20 cards worth $4/ea to rot in my binder.

-1
campeeOP•

We don't even know what's in the set yet so I don't know how you're determining the base EV, but it doesn't matter to me, it's more about the principle of charging $12 a pack (pre-order price which are all sold out everywhere) for something that costs less to produce (all reprints, no R&D costs) than cards that they sell for $4 a pack. And to do this now in the middle of the largest wave of unemployment since the great depression? Hard pass, I won't support this anymore.

11
chaoticbearSOOTHSAYER•

I'm assuming based on previous Masters set/the cards spoiled and the fact that Standard pack EV is in the shitter right now.

1
G1Scorponok•

Yeah that’s what I do with the collector boosters. Get one pack for entertainment purposes and move on

4
zero6ix•

I haven't bought a new booster set in years. Or a singleton in years. This game deserves to die, and I have been helping.

-4
Lunatic_JigglesFREAK•

Why you hanging out in a magic sub if you hate them game?

That seems like a total waste of time to me, but to each their own.

2
zero6ix•

Because I love the game, but hate the people making now. Does that clarify things, or are you gonna continue to sit on your high horse?

-3†
Lunatic_JigglesFREAK•

I'm sorry that my question came across so crass... I thought that it was reasonable.

Regardless, your answer is reasonable and I agree with your sentiment. I wouldnt ever say i hate the game though.

5
BelcherSucksCULTIST•

Chronicles 2 would kill the economic aspects of MTG even if it helped all the players that just wanna play. The reason WOTC won't do this as these leeches pay them for the ability to live off the community. So WOTC killed the value of a few cards (Sun Titan, Terastodon) by flooding reprints but made it clear that $80+ Goyfs were A okay.

Hasbro is putting pressure on WOTC to hit numbers each quarter so expect this shit to continue until a real disaster beyond shitting on Eternal, Consumer frustration en masse, and live play being scuttled. Right now, WOTC is hitting goal plus more so there is no problem.

5
campeeOP•

I was 15 when chronicles and 4th edition came out and I LOVED them. I could finally afford to play strip mine, mishra's factory, erhnam djinn, and city of brass. No one in my area even had those cards and if they did they were like $30 per card which was insane in 1995. I bought a shit ton of packs of both sets from my local game store. I never understood the hate that Chronicles got aside from a few older players who had spent way too much money on cardboard and deserved to be wrecked for being so irresponsible with their money. I'm older now and I have a massive collection ($40k last time I took inventory) and I still say reprint it all because I want to have people to play with. What's the point of useless cards sitting in my closet? If I lose money it's my own fault for getting overly invested in a children's card game. People will always want the original, compare the price of an arabian nights City of Brass to a Chronicles one. Zero functional difference between them.

17
BelcherSucksCULTIST•

Wizards is starting to get the message. Like a few years of great Standard reprints could help a lot. Stuffing cards like Mana Confluence, Mutavault (surprisingly core set friendly), the Mirage Diamonds, the Tempest Medallions, etc would satiate Commander demand and be a nice shake up from current design philosophy.

Like I have an Alpha Stasis. They could print a bunch of alt arts and it won't drop. My Shaharazad might drop a ton of it was reprinted but I doubt it. Stuff like Grim Monolith and Mox Diamond would plummet though if supply was increased by a ton.

3
CardAddictsWARLOCK•

Not saying your argument is wrong, but Goyfs can be had for $35 almost anywhere these days.

Part of the reprint problem is that each reprint pushes the price further down. Eventually, you dont want to open product because who wants to spend $X to open a pack and get a rare worth $5 when it used to be worth $50. Just take a look at previous "chase" cards and see what I mean. Leovold, Back to Basics, and Gaddock Teeg were super value when first announced.

1
BelcherSucksCULTIST•

$80 Goys was a hypothetical and a historical example.

2
Nestalim•

Still on the long run all stapples eventually go down.

1
althemighty•

Collector boosters are not packs they are a loot box. Packs are made for playing and loot boxes are made for gambling. People did not care about versioning and pimping as much in the past. Having the base cards cheaper because there is premium versions benefits everyone. The problem is that some sets like double masters forces you to pay premium prices due to the box topper cards being placed in it. The VIP packs are fine as they are the perfect not for you product that you don't need. The double masters box suck as they don't fill their purpose as a playable product as the price point is to high mainly due to the inclusion of the box toppers.

5
Lunatic_JigglesFREAK•

All magic packs are loot boxes IMO

7
ShamankingZutyNEW SPARK•

It's actually from 2003 and he goes on to say, "[T]he only way Magic was going to be a long-term success--a classic game--was for it to stand on its game play merit, not on its worthiness as an investment." Game Design Workshop, 4th Edition by Tracey Fullerton (chapter 7.12)

Prior to this, he also talks about how amazed he was at the economy of Magic cards that he saw unfolding before him while play testing prior to the games release. People valued cards different, even though they had no inherent value. "I would frequently find cards that one group of players weren't using but another group were treating like chunks of gold."

Because of this, they limited the runs of certain cards so play testers weren't given every card equally; they all had to get packs if they wanted cards, or they had to trade and bargain their way to get cards. Maybe this is even where the concept of ante came from.

3
themastersbSAVANT•

Says the guy that helped make Artifact.

2
ActualComfort6•

The monetization of artifact was fairer than most digital TCG. It was the game itself that lacked flavor.

3
pentacorpCULTIST•

You know..if MTG was an LCG and not a CCG, this would've been far different.

2