Are Booster Packs Loot Boxes?

[DirkGently]

I mean... yes? Otherwise we should also consider gacha machines loot boxes? Raffles? Many other "random" things that are decades-old?
The problem with loot boxes is that you usually can't use the thing you win (the games where skins are tradable/sellable are a minority) and that the prizes are exclusively found in the loot boxes, forcing you to gamble instead of directly buying.
Not of these points is true for booster boxes.
If someone don't think these things matters and is against loot boxes only because they are "random" are either too detached with reality or arguing for the sake of arguing.

I think the things that are problematic about loot boxes - the way they prey on addiction, the way they prey on children, the way random rewards can be psychologically manipulative - are absolutely present in booster packs. I don't think being digital vs physical goods makes a difference to those elements. I also think the goods being sellable doesn't make a difference to those elements. If anything, it makes it worse since it can become outright gambling, whereas with unsellable goods at least you know you're throwing the money away, and you're not going to keep buying in the hopes of lucking your way out of the hole.

The goods being BUYABLE does make a difference. It's very possible to play magic and never crack a booster pack thanks to the secondary market. Of course, that's not true for MTGA, but we're talking primarily about physical boosters. I'm not sure there's a good argument to be made that MTGA boosters aren't loot boxes. While this feature of physical cards being buyable certainly makes magic as a whole a better game, I don't think it makes booster packs not loot boxes, just because an alternative also exists.

Not sure what you mean about "you usually can't use the thing you win". Like for games where skins apply to specific characters or whatever? How is that not true for magic? You're trying to build a mono-red deck and you open a blue rare, for example? Feels absolutely core to booster packs tbh. At any rate, while this is an annoyance of loot box systems, I don't think it's part of the conceptual problem with them - at least, not beyond the simple fact that you aren't outright buying the product you want. Even if you were guaranteed to get skins that you could use with your chosen character, loot boxes could still easily achieve the same psychological ends by making specific skins more desirable and motivating players to buy more loot boxes for a chance to get them. Or simply making skins incredibly piecemeal where you have to get dozens of pieces to build a full outfit. But maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying?

I don't know what a gacha machine is - raffles are gambling, but they aren't loot boxes because there's usually only one opportunity to get the thing, and you either get it or you don't. There's no "ah, crap, I didn't get it...well, what's another $2?" until you've spent thousands, like can happen to addicts in loot box systems. If someone had a raffle for something valuable, and then kept doing it over and over, giving people the opportunity to gamble over and over for the thing they wanted, then maybe it'd be kind of close to how loot boxes operate psychologically, but most raffles don't operate that way.

[onering]

Another difference I notice is that one of the tricks that free to play, and even AAA games, that use loot boxes is that you often get free loot boxes as part of playing, which entices some people to purchase a few after awhile, and then build up from there.

[ilovesaprolings]

snip

You are looking at the problem from now instead of looking at the past and going up until the present.
"random boxes" existed since when? 1950? 1900? Sports figurine, then superhero figurine, then whatever.
Then gashapon machines (often aimed at children).
Then trading card games.
Where they a problem? Were they associated to gambling? Nope.
It's only when videogames loot boxes came out that the problems started.
Because video games used the scummy practices i said before:
- you can't sell what you win
- you can't trade what you win
- you can buy the thing you want only if start gambling with loot boxes.

No one of this things were true for the "physical" loot boxes and this is what keep them good.
The practice i mentioned before make loot boxes way more similar to slot machines than to boosters.
With a slot machine, you spin the slot and unless you got the precious 777 jackpot, you get a useless 3 symbol combination that is untradeable and unsellable.

Wanting that precious magma skin for your archer hero, having to buy a loot box for a 0,1% chance to getting it as it's the only way to "buy" it, opening useless crap like premium horse food or a tank hero skin 99% of times it's terribly similar to spinning the slot for that 0,1% of jackpot and getting useless combinations all the time.
Meanwhile, with that blue rare you found you can sell it, trade it for a red rare, or make a blue-red deck.

All these scummy tactics make loot boxes so addictive, not just the fact they are random.

[Card Slinger J]

Are card singles Pay-to-Win just as much as booster packs are Loot Boxes? Absolutely. While it's not a random chance like Loot Boxes are, the main draw behind card singles is that the more money you have the more likely you are to win. The tipping point is when you own all the cards and only then does it become more competitive. That's when it becomes Pay-to-Play where you have to be more upfront with the cost of the cards you own. You still have to pay money to get a spot at the table, just like gambling at a casino with Poker and Blackjack.

At some point the companies behind Paper Trading Card Games / Collectible Card Games are going to have to change their business model or it literally becomes a Whale product in order to keep it afloat. "Pay-to-Win" is what it is because until you get into that "pod" where you and your playgroup have already put in the $300+ then you're not playing at the same competitive level as everyone else. The question then becomes, "Do I have the mental fortitude to outsmart and outmaneuver my opponents in raw skill?"

No because until you have all the cards, your money absolutely affects how you play Paper Trading Card Games / Collectible Card Games. Only when you acquire the actual cards is when skill is applied. "Pay-to-Win" revolves around netdecking so much to the point where the business model itself attracts those kinds of people. You're unable to netdeck in KeyForge because every deck is specifically designed to be unique though I could make a similar argument about sealed events and booster drafts. I think it's dependent on what kind of dopamine rush you're looking for.

There does seem to be some sort of "marriage" between creating these finely tuned machined decks to be sold onto the Secondary Market for people with credit cards as it's made this niche gaming genre of Paper Trading Card Games / Collectible Card Games cannibalize itself in a way that's very unhealthy. Of course the original intent was to provide players with a sense of pride and accomplishment for "wasting" their money but now that the ongoing pandemic has made it more difficult to play it's rather a moot point.

[onering]

Are card singles Pay-to-Win just as much as booster packs are Loot Boxes? Absolutely. While it's not a random chance like Loot Boxes are, the main draw behind card singles is that the more money you have the more likely you are to win. The tipping point is when you own all the cards and only then does it become more competitive. That's when it becomes Pay-to-Play where you have to be more upfront with the cost of the cards you own. You still have to pay money to get a spot at the table, just like gambling at a casino with Poker and Blackjack.

At some point the companies behind Paper Trading Card Games / Collectible Card Games are going to have to change their business model or it literally becomes a Whale product in order to keep it afloat. "Pay-to-Win" is what it is because until you get into that "pod" where you and your playgroup have already put in the $300+ then you're not playing at the same competitive level as everyone else. The question then becomes, "Do I have the mental fortitude to outsmart and outmaneuver my opponents in raw skill?"

No because until you have all the cards, your money absolutely affects how you play Paper Trading Card Games / Collectible Card Games. Only when you acquire the actual cards is when skill is applied. "Pay-to-Win" revolves around netdecking so much to the point where the business model itself attracts those kinds of people. You're unable to netdeck in KeyForge because every deck is specifically designed to be unique though I could make a similar argument about sealed events and booster drafts. I think it's dependent on what kind of dopamine rush you're looking for.

There does seem to be some sort of "marriage" between creating these finely tuned machined decks to be sold onto the Secondary Market for people with credit cards as it's made this niche gaming genre of Paper Trading Card Games / Collectible Card Games cannibalize itself in a way that's very unhealthy. Of course the original intent was to provide players with a sense of pride and accomplishment for "wasting" their money but now that the ongoing pandemic has made it more difficult to play it's rather a moot point.

All games are pay to play unless they are free. Barring piracy, I can't play call of duty unless I pay for it. TCGs differ from one shot payment videogames in that you buy the pieces individually. TCGs, by their very nature advertise that certain game pieces are better than others and will thus be more valuable than others to people who play the game.

Functionally, the scenario you describe, where you must pay $300 for your deck, is not the norm. The most common way people play magic is 60 card casual, and 60 card casual decks are usually pretty cheap. Yes, there are some playgroups that play strong, expensive decks that way, but most people are playing what they got in the lot the bought on Amazon, or budget decks. Commander is the second most popular format, and despite what the more extreme cEDH aficionados would have you believe it is a mostly casual format, and people buying precons and modifying them is one of the main ways people engage with the format. It's actually not very hard to play magic on the cheap and have fun if you're playing with friends.

Now when it comes to competitive magic, that's a different story, but how different depends on the level of competitive. Nobody is entitled to play at the top tier, or at major events, where you absolutely need the best decks fully tuned to compete. The price of magic cards is driven by scarcity and demand. All mythics in a set are equally rare, but you'll pay $50 for some and $1 for others because of demand. And sometimes, that $1 mythic will jump $20 overnight because someone built a rogue deck that is now the new hotness, which drives up it's demand. But generally, if a deck is too tier it's cards will be the most expensive because they are in the most demand. Once that deck falls out of favor, the price of any cards that are only really used in that deck drops. This is an important aspect of the game, as it encourages people to experiment rather than just settle on the established best deck by default. Because there is the possibility that certain cards are undervalued, savvy brewer's can and do experiment with underplayed strategies and discover their strengths. At lower levels of play, where most people experience tournament magic such as FNOs and other smaller events, you can absolutely get away with running cheap %$#% and beating the more expensive decks if you have skill. Its not available every standard, but more often than not a cheap, sub $50 Red Deck Wins variant is available that can run FNO tables just by being fast and consistent, and punishing mistakes.

The only places where you are consistently locked out of any chance of winning unless you bring a $300 top tier deck are the higher level tournaments, and nobody is entitled to play in those.

[DirkGently]

- you can't sell what you win
- you can't trade what you win
- you can buy the thing you want only if start gambling with loot boxes.

I think we're hitting a bit of a wall here. Obviously there are differences between physical goods and digital goods, especially when those digital goods are account locked. In my opinion - and from what I understand, in the opinion of most governments that are legislating loot boxes - those differences you've outlined, while true, are not the element of loot boxes that makes them problematic. That is, however a matter of opinion. Strictly speaking, sure, there are differences, it just depends on what you consider to be the problematic elements of loot boxes.

Wanting that precious magma skin for your archer hero, having to buy a loot box for a 0,1% chance to getting it as it's the only way to "buy" it, opening useless crap like premium horse food or a tank hero skin 99% of times it's terribly similar to spinning the slot for that 0,1% of jackpot and getting useless combinations all the time.
Meanwhile, with that blue rare you found you can sell it, trade it for a red rare, or make a blue-red deck.

I'm not sure why you think this is a good argument. If you get a tank hero skin, can't you just play that hero? I don't know which game specifically you're referencing, but generally-speaking, I believe you get cosmetics that can be used on SOME character, just like a card can be played in SOME deck. Although that's not quite accurate since most cards are essentially unplayable in any competitive sense.

And you can play a hero without cosmetics, whereas to play a deck you need ALL the cards in that deck. I mean, there are obviously plusses to the booster system compared to loot boxes, but you're ignoring a HUGE downside of the booster system when compared to cosmetic loot boxes, which is that the "loot" is required to play the game, not just to look cool.

As long as the secondary market exists, whenever you open a booster pack, you're either making money, losing money, or breaking even. To a certain extent, it doesn't matter whether the card fits into your deck - if you open a 10 cent rare you needed for your deck, you still lost $3. If you open a rare you don't need, then you either won or lost money depending how valuable that rare is. It's pretty much exactly a slot machine, except that a slot machine you'll often get literally $0 out of it, whereas a booster pack most of the time you get a 50-cent rare out of it. You pay a set amount of money, and win a random amount of money. Do you really think that's better in a meaningful way?

@Card Slinger J While that's kiiiind of true, skill can absolutely make up for budget within certain limits. Probably it won't let you win a pro tour with draft chaff, but skill can absolutely make a bigger difference than, say, having fetchlands vs budget lands. The closer the gap in budget, the bigger a role skill takes. Unless you're talking limited - then it's all skill and luck, which is why it's the best way to play the game.

[Yatsufusa]

I think we're hitting a bit of a wall here. Obviously there are differences between physical goods and digital goods, especially when those digital goods are account locked. In my opinion - and from what I understand, in the opinion of most governments that are legislating loot boxes - those differences you've outlined, while true, are not the element of loot boxes that makes them problematic. That is, however a matter of opinion. Strictly speaking, sure, there are differences, it just depends on what you consider to be the problematic elements of loot boxes.

This is the crux. Loot Boxes are the "unholy matrimony" of the randomness of Booster Packs/Gacha combined with the lack of ownership/secondary market of digital goods. There definitely has been people who disagree with each system all along, but the rise of loot boxes basically united them in some ways. But as with any union, there will exist friction of people who think the actual problem lies with the one issue they stand for, and the other one is "fine" if alone.

There are people who think Gacha/Booster Packs are fine, because lottery systems existed way before that. They are vehemently against the lack of ownership/resellability of digital goods. The problem didn't rise as much before loot boxes because people treated buying them like watching a movie, you paid for the experience (and in fact get to watch it again if you want to). Once it "wedded" with Gacha systems, suddenly you're flooded with plenty of digital goods you don't want and with no way to get rid of them (or the way to get rid of them is essentially donating them to void). People feel the loss more heavily because their losses are/were visible in front of them, which makes them even "worse" than even the lottery, because lottery losses are largely "invisible". The largest proponent is that companies have the technology to emulate secondary markets to fix it, but as we all know, greed.

The other side of the group acknowledges said greed and admits no one in the digital sphere is going to craft out a legal digital secondary market solely for the benefit of the consumer (even if they did, there will be so many strings played it'll look like the Secret Lair Ultimate Edition). So they go against the Gacha aspect of Loot Boxes instead, that since there is no ownership of digital goods, there shouldn't be random elements in paid products. Some of them stretch the argument over the physical goods like paper MTG, pointing out that even if the secondary market of self-formed by the players/collectors because it was enabled by physicality, it's essentially still subject to the corruption string play, therefore Gacha is the root problem. In some ways they are against huge Secondary Markets as a whole, because no party can be trusted, but RNG expounds the problem because it creates rarity and encourages artificial scarcity at a faster rate.

Let's just say generally speaking, as people already knee-deep in our own Secondary Markets, like us (and other TCG players) are more inclined to side with first group. People who spend their gaming lives digitally already used to not actually owning anything and have not really seen the Secondary Market are more inclined to the second group. Both are against Loot Boxes, albeit from different perspective. What's truly terrifying is whether we'll create a generation of gamers used to Loot Boxes, basically the worst aspects from each side. Companies definitely want that though.

[onering]

Yatsufa: your mention of RNG got me thinking a bit. Boosters don't actually operate by RNG. The cards all exist before they are opened, and before they are even put in the packs. They are randomly sorted, in a way, but they are already printed in certain amounts.

Wizards already prints the cards, so the choice is between selling them directly, selling only precons, or putting them in packs. Selling them in packs allows them to set a single price for a certain number of cards of each rarity + the occasional bonus foil. Selling individually means that they would either have to price each card equally within their rarity tiers, which means they'd only sell the most in demand cards, or they'd have to try to predict the demand for each card and price accordingly. In either case, there will be plenty of cards that won't get sold, and the in demand cards will sell out due to demand and still be subject to secondary market forces. Selling them solely through precons is a more viable option, but it too has its drawbacks. Rares and mythics are typically Singleton's in these, so you'd have to buy multiple precons of the one you want and still end up with a bunch of cards you dont. Selling out of what is in demand will still happen, we've seen this with actual pre cons, and this again creates a secondary market to meet demand. True Name Nemesis is a test case here, it was worth a good amount more based on demand than the msrp of the deck it was in, which led to the deck selling out quickly, being sold for far above msrp where it didn't sell out. So your left with Boosters and Precons being the only two models that could be feasible, but boosters enable limited, which is how a large amount of packs are opened and cards introduced into the secondary market anyway, so they have an added value beyond being a way to sell product.

Dirk: I have to say that the physical nature of boosters does actually directly address some of the most problematic issues around loot boxes. It is more difficult to prey on children, and more difficult to get someone to hit the "why not another $2" loop when there are actual physical barriers in place. One of the ways loot boxes are able to prey on children is that they can be purchased using an game attached credit card very quickly and repeatedly without parental knowledge using in app purchases. For boosters, a kid actually has to go to the store, or at least an online store, and even in the latter case they are less likely to have direct access to a parents credit card than with in app purchases. Even if you are buying online, the why not $2 more loop is broken, because that loop requires you opening your booster, seeing you didn't get what you want, and then deciding to open another. When you buy from SCG or Amazon, you can certainly keep feeding money in but you have to wait for the boosters to arrive and open them to see if you want to feed more money in. This results in the why not one more booster model not working, as that model requires the allure of each purchase being a relatively small amount of money and leading to instant feedback and thus an instant opportunity to make the next purchase. That takes too long when you have to wait on product, so to spend a lot quickly you need to buy in bulk, which sort of breaks the loop because you are much more aware of the cost of say buying a box. In person, at a store, you are in front of people and limited by there supply. In Walmart or Target, you will quickly run out of product to open, while in a LGS that's less of a problem, but being in front of people puts psychological pressure against continuing.

[BeneTleilax]

no.

[ilovesaprolings]

I think we're hitting a bit of a wall here. Obviously there are differences between physical goods and digital goods

It's not a matter of physical and digital. Some games could easily make skins sellable/tradeable and they don't. Ask yourself why.
(answer: they make people spend more this way)

In my opinion - and from what I understand, in the opinion of most governments that are legislating loot boxes - those differences you've outlined, while true, are not the element of loot boxes that makes them problematic.

Yeah, wrong opinion. Something being random isn't enough to trigger a gambling mindset. Think about someone:
- continously spinning the slot until he wins something
- continously opening loot boxes until he finds the skin he wants
- continously opening booster packs until he finds the rare he wants
i don't believe the last one ever happens.

I'm not sure why you think this is a good argument. If you get a tank hero skin, can't you just play that hero?

MOBAs usually have 50-100 character with at least 2-3 skins per character, so it's hard to find a skin you need.
Your solution is to simply stop playing the heroes you like and start playing what loot boxes tell you to play?
You think that people will really do this, or they will simply spend more and more until they find what they want?

As long as the secondary market exists, whenever you open a booster pack, you're either making money, losing money, or breaking even. To a certain extent, it doesn't matter whether the card fits into your deck - if you open a 10 cent rare you needed for your deck, you still lost $3. If you open a rare you don't need, then you either won or lost money depending how valuable that rare is. It's pretty much exactly a slot machine, except that a slot machine you'll often get literally $0 out of it, whereas a booster pack most of the time you get a 50-cent rare out of it. You pay a set amount of money, and win a random amount of money. Do you really think that's better in a meaningful way?

It's not a matter of money. Even if "lose money", i can still trade/gift the cards to my friends not caring about the secondary market prices. Way more inclusive and way easier to stop any "gambling" this way.

I have seen people spend tons of money for dumb loot boxes. The reason was always the high (and artificial) exclusivity of the items inside it. People wanting a single premium items and the only way to ever get it being opening it in a loot box. They did not want to open a random box because they thought they were random.

As i said, videogames are coupling randomness with other shady practice to exacerbate the problem. I don't why you are so adamant at ignoring this and only want to think that loot boxes are a problem because they are random. I care about practical implications instead of just aknowledging that by definition loot boxes and booster packs are the same thing.

[DirkGently]

It's not a matter of physical and digital. Some games could easily make skins sellable/tradeable and they don't. Ask yourself why.
(answer: they make people spend more this way)

But some loot boxed goods are tradeable...and those are still generally considered loot boxes.

Unless you think those don't count as loot boxes, being non-tradeable cannot be a necessary quality of loot boxes.

Yeah, wrong opinion. Something being random isn't enough to trigger a gambling mindset. Think about someone:
- continously spinning the slot until he wins something
- continously opening loot boxes until he finds the skin he wants
- continously opening booster packs until he finds the rare he wants
I don't believe the last one ever happens.

Just because you don't think that happens, doesn't mean it doesn't happen. I think it happens less now, especially among adults, with the secondary market having greater prominence, but kids definitely spend their money on boosters. In one of the profs vids (maybe this one, actually) he talks about skipping meals to save money to buy boosters. That sounds pretty addictive to me. The nature of buying physical goods usually precludes little Timmy from spending 10 large on booster packs, but that doesn't mean the psychological motivation isn't there.

Booster packs are probably less addictive than other forms of gambling, but that doesn't mean they aren't gambling.

I'd argue that booster packs are probably somewhere on the gradual evolution of gambling that has gotten more distilled to produce the most addictive forms of loot boxes. They operate on essentially the exact same principles, they're just limited by being a physical good.

MOBAs usually have 50-100 character with at least 2-3 skins per character, so it's hard to find a skin you need.
Your solution is to simply stop playing the heroes you like and start playing what loot boxes tell you to play?
You think that people will really do this, or they will simply spend more and more until they find what they want?

Your solution to getting a rare in another color is to simply stop playing the color you like and start playing what the rares you open tell you to play?

Also, it really cannot be understated that you're talking about (no offense) pointless cosmetic upgrades whereas magic cards are a fundamental game piece. That difference alone is enormous and you don't seem to acknowledge it at all. Wherever games have pay-to-win loot boxes, gamers lose their absolute minds. Whereas MtG has been using that as their core business model since the game debuted and nobody bats an eye.

It's not a matter of money. Even if "lose money", i can still trade/gift the cards to my friends not caring about the secondary market prices. Way more inclusive and way easier to stop any "gambling" this way.

So...if someone sells you a quarter for a dollar, but you give the quarter to your friend and he enjoys playing with the quarter, and neither of you care about the value of your money...you didn't get ripped off?

I mean sure, if you lose money once on a booster, and don't understand/care and don't feel compelled to buy more, then no harm no foul. If someone sits down at a slot machine once and loses a dollar and doesn't spend any more, then no harm no foul. But that doesn't mean it wasn't gambling.

I have seen people spend tons of money for dumb loot boxes. The reason was always the high (and artificial) exclusivity of the items inside it. People wanting a single premium items and the only way to ever get it being opening it in a loot box. They did not want to open a random box because they thought they were random.

As i said, videogames are coupling randomness with other shady practice to exacerbate the problem. I don't why you are so adamant at ignoring this and only want to think that loot boxes are a problem because they are random. I care about practical implications instead of just aknowledging that by definition loot boxes and booster packs are the same thing.

I definitely think that loot boxes are a more sophisticated version of booster packs in a lot of ways. But whenever I hear about people getting ripped off by loot boxes, big enough to be a major scandal that makes the news, more often than not the amount they're talking about PALES in comparison to how much I've spent on MtG over my lifetime. So who really has the more effective business model here?

EDIT: btw, while I'm on the topic - I think when you look at stuff like collector boosters, and double masters, to me that looks like wotc trying to take power away from the secondary market and push people to crack boosters instead by making them more "fun". And also, of course, cards being untradeable in MTGA.

[ilovesaprolings]

I think it happens less now, especially among adults, with the secondary market having greater prominence, but kids definitely spend their money on boosters. In one of the profs vids (maybe this one, actually) he talks about skipping meals to save money to buy boosters. That sounds pretty addictive to me. The nature of buying physical goods usually precludes little Timmy from spending 10 large on booster packs, but that doesn't mean the psychological motivation isn't there.

Would it be any different if the kid skipped lunch to buy a commander deck (so not randomized)? No
I have done the same as a kid plenty of times. And i have done that to buy video games, action figures, and many other non-randomized things. Kids have been always trying to use their parents money to buy toys and will always do.

What's wrong is continuosly open boosters to find THAT card, ending up spending more than you have thoughts until you reach unrational levels. Like i have seen people ending up spending 100$ for a premium mount, when a regular mount cost 5$... and still not getting it.
You don't see people spending 100$ in booster because they want the 5$ foil rare.

So...if someone sells you a quarter for a dollar, but you give the quarter to your friend and he enjoys playing with the quarter, and neither of you care about the value of your money...you didn't get ripped off?

You never gift something to your friends? Yeah i have been "ripped off" by my friends, giving them dollar rares for a quarter, so they could assemble new decks and play them with me.

Your solution to getting a rare in another color is to simply stop playing the color you like and start playing what the rares you open tell you to play?

My solution is to trade or sell that rare. If you can't, you can still play it by changing your deck. You can still keep many cards of your original deck and just adda color. You have way more options with cards than with digital goods.

The whole "they are just luxury things" argument doesn't really make sense and is what scummy videogame industries have told since they introduced loot boxes. Yeah they aren't necessary goods. Same as magic cards: you can't find food in a booster. Loot boxes are still blocking the customers for buying what they actually want.

[onering]

Skipping lunch to pocket your lunch money is a time honored kid tradition. They've been doing it as long as there has been lunch money and %$#% kids want to buy. If the product is cheap enough that they only have to skip lunch a couple times, kids will weigh the temporary discomfort of waiting a couple hours between when they start to get hungry and when they can pour themselves a bowl of cereal after getting home vs getting the free money to buy what they want. And that's if they actually don't eat. Some kids will bum some sides from their friends, others will sneak something from home into school and eat that at lunch. How often they do this is the key. A kid that does it a lot to fund a particular habit is displaying addictive behavior, a kid that does it a few times is being a kid.

[DirkGently]

I never used my lunch money to buy anything except lunch when I was a kid. But fair enough, I don't have a lot of evidence in terms of addictive behavior with booster packs, and tbh I don't have enough interest in trying to dredge some up, if it exists (which it may not). I've had friends that spent quite a bit gambling on booster packs, but they had plenty of money to blow a bit on terrible decisions so it wasn't an actual problem afaik (urza's legacy? Really? At that price point?). Granted, I also don't have any personal friends who have blown a lot on loot boxes either, I just hear about it. But it's certainly possible that, despite their similarities conceptually, booster packs aren't addictive in the same way.

Obviously a big part of that is, if you want a specific card, buying it as a single is going to be many times more efficient than cracking boosters until you find it. You'd have to be pretty deranged to want some specific full-art foil mythic and decide to just start buying premium boosters until you find one. But I do wonder how true that was when mtg was in its infancy and the secondary market was much more limited, and the internet was less pervasive. I can imagine people cracking boosters looking for something specific back then...but that's just speculation.

That still isn't to say it isn't gambling. Likely Richard Garfield didn't originally think of it as being gambling, or that cards would have so much value. You just got some random cards and that's what you played with, limited-style. But at this point, with the secondary market so close at hand, it certainly meets the definition of gambling, regardless of how addictive it is or isn't. But much like alcohol is a drug but we're ok with it because it's been legal long enough that we're used to it, booster packs being gambling doesn't mean we're going to ban them so long as they're not causing problems. Although that analogy kind of sucks because alcohol causes a lot of problems, but hopefully you get the point. Which is...legalize it, I guess?

[Card Slinger J]

All games are pay to play unless they are free. Barring piracy, I can't play call of duty unless I pay for it. TCGs differ from one shot payment videogames in that you buy the pieces individually. TCGs, by their very nature advertise that certain game pieces are better than others and will thus be more valuable than others to people who play the game.

Functionally, the scenario you describe, where you must pay $300 for your deck, is not the norm. The most common way people play magic is 60 card casual, and 60 card casual decks are usually pretty cheap. Yes, there are some playgroups that play strong, expensive decks that way, but most people are playing what they got in the lot the bought on Amazon, or budget decks. Commander is the second most popular format, and despite what the more extreme cEDH aficionados would have you believe it is a mostly casual format, and people buying precons and modifying them is one of the main ways people engage with the format. It's actually not very hard to play magic on the cheap and have fun if you're playing with friends.

Tying into the YongYea YouTube video I posted earlier in this thread, MTG does indeed fall in line to the business practice of "Subscription" which involves giving players the sense that they HAVE to keep playing a game to feel like they get the most out of the money they invested into a microtransaction's purchase. It's basically another way of saying "sunk cost fallacy" essentially. The feeling that you can't back out from something even If it's to your detriment because you've already invested so much time and resources into it because you'd feel like as though it'd be a waste to withdraw.

"Sunk cost fallacy" is pretty much the opposite of "quit while you're ahead" and that's sort of what this psychological concept of "Subscription" is referring to. Players put money into a game, they feel like they can't just back out because it'd be a waste of money, they feel like they have to keep playing to justify their purchase, and that may give them even more reason to spend more money on the game and this vicious cycle continues. For the player it becomes a lot harder for them to walk away the more time and money they keep putting into a game. In other words this scheme drives retention and monetization all in one foul swoop.

The only places where you are consistently locked out of any chance of winning unless you bring a $300 top tier deck are the higher level tournaments, and nobody is entitled to play in those.

Try the current Paper EDH / Commander Secondary Market where most players are being priced out of the format from a mass exodus of MTG players leaving Standard for EDH / Commander unless they go out and buy a PreCon or a Custom made deck on eBay for much cheaper. With a lot of Local Game Stores (LGSs) going out of business due to the pandemic, players are panic buying EDH staples left and right with no sign of relief for reprints to help quell the price spikes whether If it's from Secret Lair drops or Masters sets.

That still isn't to say it isn't gambling. Likely Richard Garfield didn't originally think of it as being gambling, or that cards would have so much value. You just got some random cards and that's what you played with, limited-style. But at this point, with the secondary market so close at hand, it certainly meets the definition of gambling, regardless of how addictive it is or isn't. But much like alcohol is a drug but we're ok with it because it's been legal long enough that we're used to it, booster packs being gambling doesn't mean we're going to ban them so long as they're not causing problems. Although that analogy kind of sucks because alcohol causes a lot of problems, but hopefully you get the point. Which is...legalize it, I guess?

Well when you have someone like Richard Garfield who designed MTG to be mathematically addictive in every conceivable way it's hard to argue against that. I don't think he really took into account just how addictive his game really was or how it would end up leading to the type of gaming industry we see today. I can't help but wonder If he's had any regrets designing MTG the way he has that's allowed Wizards of the Coast to become a sad parody of what they once were. It's because MTG is so amazing that Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro can get away with just about anything whether If it's promoting cheaters and scammers knowing full well that they can get away with any illegal crime or anything unethical.

[toctheyounger]

Well when you have someone like Richard Garfield who designed MTG to be mathematically addictive in every conceivable way it's hard to argue against that.

A quick correct. Garfield never intended the randomized, lottery style element of booster packs (or at least didn't want it so prevalent), and I believe it may even be part of why he isn't involved now. It's also why he designed Keyforge the way it's designed.

[Card Slinger J]

Well when you have someone like Richard Garfield who designed MTG to be mathematically addictive in every conceivable way it's hard to argue against that.

A quick correct. Garfield never intended the randomized, lottery style element of booster packs (or at least didn't want it so prevalent), and I believe it may even be part of why he isn't involved now. It's also why he designed Keyforge the way it's designed.

Glad you brought this up. This would also explain why he left MTG for good after helping design Dominaria.

[5colorsrainbow]

Well when you have someone like Richard Garfield who designed MTG to be mathematically addictive in every conceivable way it's hard to argue against that.

A quick correct. Garfield never intended the randomized, lottery style element of booster packs (or at least didn't want it so prevalent), and I believe it may even be part of why he isn't involved now. It's also why he designed Keyforge the way it's designed.

Glad you brought this up. This would also explain why he left MTG for good after helping design Dominaria.

For source for that?

[onering]

All games are pay to play unless they are free. Barring piracy, I can't play call of duty unless I pay for it. TCGs differ from one shot payment videogames in that you buy the pieces individually. TCGs, by their very nature advertise that certain game pieces are better than others and will thus be more valuable than others to people who play the game.

Functionally, the scenario you describe, where you must pay $300 for your deck, is not the norm. The most common way people play magic is 60 card casual, and 60 card casual decks are usually pretty cheap. Yes, there are some playgroups that play strong, expensive decks that way, but most people are playing what they got in the lot the bought on Amazon, or budget decks. Commander is the second most popular format, and despite what the more extreme cEDH aficionados would have you believe it is a mostly casual format, and people buying precons and modifying them is one of the main ways people engage with the format. It's actually not very hard to play magic on the cheap and have fun if you're playing with friends.

Tying into the YongYea YouTube video I posted earlier in this thread, MTG does indeed fall in line to the business practice of "Subscription" which involves giving players the sense that they HAVE to keep playing a game to feel like they get the most out of the money they invested into a microtransaction's purchase. It's basically another way of saying "sunk cost fallacy" essentially. The feeling that you can't back out from something even If it's to your detriment because you've already invested so much time and resources into it because you'd feel like as though it'd be a waste to withdraw.

"Sunk cost fallacy" is pretty much the opposite of "quit while you're ahead" and that's sort of what this psychological concept of "Subscription" is referring to. Players put money into a game, they feel like they can't just back out because it'd be a waste of money, they feel like they have to keep playing to justify their purchase, and that may give them even more reason to spend more money on the game and this vicious cycle continues. For the player it becomes a lot harder for them to walk away the more time and money they keep putting into a game. In other words this scheme drives retention and monetization all in one foul swoop.

The only places where you are consistently locked out of any chance of winning unless you bring a $300 top tier deck are the higher level tournaments, and nobody is entitled to play in those.

Try the current Paper EDH / Commander Secondary Market where most players are being priced out of the format from a mass exodus of MTG players leaving Standard for EDH / Commander unless they go out and buy a PreCon or a Custom made deck on eBay for much cheaper. With a lot of Local Game Stores (LGSs) going out of business due to the pandemic, players are panic buying EDH staples left and right with no sign of relief for reprints to help quell the price spikes whether If it's from Secret Lair drops or Masters sets.

That still isn't to say it isn't gambling. Likely Richard Garfield didn't originally think of it as being gambling, or that cards would have so much value. You just got some random cards and that's what you played with, limited-style. But at this point, with the secondary market so close at hand, it certainly meets the definition of gambling, regardless of how addictive it is or isn't. But much like alcohol is a drug but we're ok with it because it's been legal long enough that we're used to it, booster packs being gambling doesn't mean we're going to ban them so long as they're not causing problems. Although that analogy kind of sucks because alcohol causes a lot of problems, but hopefully you get the point. Which is...legalize it, I guess?

Well when you have someone like Richard Garfield who designed MTG to be mathematically addictive in every conceivable way it's hard to argue against that. I don't think he really took into account just how addictive his game really was or how it would end up leading to the type of gaming industry we see today. I can't help but wonder If he's had any regrets designing MTG the way he has that's allowed Wizards of the Coast to become a sad parody of what they once were. It's because MTG is so amazing that Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro can get away with just about anything whether If it's promoting cheaters and scammers knowing full well that they can get away with any illegal crime or anything unethical.

And yet people sell their collections all the time. People stop playing magic. And depending on what they play, many people who do continue to play spend very little yearly because they don't need much that came out that year, just buying the few singles they want instead. I'm not seeing any evidence that people are getting sucked into a loop of microtransactions that suddenly result in them dropping thousands of dollars without thinking, which is the big problem behind certain applications of microtransactions and loot boxes.

Subscriptions are suddenly problematic now? Yeah, once you are subscribed to something, you are more likely to renew the subscription than you would have been to subscribe in the first place. That's not a sunk cost fallacy situation, that's the fact that you have this product or service in your life and want to keep it there. You always seem to see the worst possible explanation in everything. People keep playing magic because they like magic. You can definitely keep playing it without spending hundreds a year, and thats certainly true of commander if you don't have deckbuilding add and you aren't playing cEDH. Budget versions of many decks aren't that far off from tuned versions, especially when you start cutting fetches and duals for budget options.

Personally, for me, the magic product that has most dominated my fear of missing out has been commander precons. Those are non randomized products btw, and they were the thing I was most likely to buy even if I didn't have immediate plans for them. Boosters? Only if I'm drafting them. Maybe a couple times a year I'll buy one of those green boxes with reduced price boosters in them from Walmart for a lark, or I'll find something that was mispriced and cajole the cashier into letting me buy it far below msrp.

You're setting up a false dichotomy where you either spend hundreds of dollars a year or you have to quit magic, and while that's necessary for you argument to work it's also flat out not true. You have to spend hundreds a year to keep playing high level tournament magic, you can get by on less to play fnms and you can get away with spending dozens of even nothing to keep up with commander. I have decks that I haven't updated in years that still do well.


%$#%, I wonder what you think about companies coming out with new videogames? Like, is it predatory that they release a new Madden every year? If they released a new call of duty every few years, would that fall under the subscription dilemma? What about Netflix? Is paying a subscription for that predatory? The argument is rubbish, and appealing to the "authority" of a random YouTuber who also made it doesn't make it less rubbish.

I did realize I'm wrong that some games aren't actually pay to play. I've been playing Elder Scrolls Blades and I have not and will not spend a dime on it. It's pretty ok. The loot boxes are basically just chests when you don't pay for them. I'd rather have paid $60 for Hammerfell though.

[umtiger]

Try the current Paper EDH / Commander Secondary Market where most players are being priced out of the format from a mass exodus of MTG players leaving Standard for EDH / Commander unless they go out and buy a PreCon or a Custom made deck on eBay for much cheaper. With a lot of Local Game Stores (LGSs) going out of business due to the pandemic, players are panic buying EDH staples left and right with no sign of relief for reprints to help quell the price spikes whether If it's from Secret Lair drops or Masters sets.

Yes, we all personally experience not being able to afford a specific card(s). But that does not mean you are priced out of participating. No one is being priced out of EDH.

I just wonder what exactly is the end game here for people who want boosters abolished?

[pokken]

I think the natural end state is some variant of wizards selling singles wholesale direct to vendors (e.g. gamestores) - and drafting moving mostly online. Every card in the history of the game available for order, longer delivery time, costs sustained by the wholesale cost from Wizards being based on demand for the card.

I have no idea if that will ever happen, and there are certainly a lot of issues with it to work out, but it's one potential end I can envision.

That's essentially what they're doing with Secret Lairs. And they could surely make it so certain cards are only available for certain time frames - or cost a premium when "out of print cycle" or whatever. Lots of ways to skin it.

[onering]

I think the natural end state is some variant of wizards selling singles wholesale direct to vendors (e.g. gamestores) - and drafting moving mostly online. Every card in the history of the game available for order, longer delivery time, costs sustained by the wholesale cost from Wizards being based on demand for the card.

I have no idea if that will ever happen, and there are certainly a lot of issues with it to work out, but it's one potential end I can envision.

That's essentially what they're doing with Secret Lairs. And they could surely make it so certain cards are only available for certain time frames - or cost a premium when "out of print cycle" or whatever. Lots of ways to skin it.

I'm skeptical of this. The potential problems with boosters are much more prevalent online since you can instantly buy more packs whenever you get the itch, with just a click, and you aren't limited by things like your bank freezing your card because you made too many individual purchases too quickly or even just the physical issue of handling the cards. That means that if Wizards were to try to get rid of booster to head off any loot box issues, they'd have to do so online as well, which means that drafts would have to be phantom. I doubt they would indeed go this route, because they wouldn't make as much money from phantom drafts as drafts that use product, which for wizards costs nothing more than the phantom drafts to implement. It also means that they would be designing draft formats solely for online phantom play, having gotten rid of paper drafts, which would mean the same amount of effort going into designing cards and draft formats with less money coming in for it. It also means that the non randomized packs, or direct sales of singles, would be more expensive to compensate not only for the fact that people are no longer buying randomized packs, but for the fact that less product is being sold overall (as people are no longer cracking boosters to draft).

[umtiger]

I think the natural end state is some variant of wizards selling singles wholesale direct to vendors (e.g. gamestores) - and drafting moving mostly online. Every card in the history of the game available for order, longer delivery time, costs sustained by the wholesale cost from Wizards being based on demand for the card.

I have no idea if that will ever happen, and there are certainly a lot of issues with it to work out, but it's one potential end I can envision.

That's essentially what they're doing with Secret Lairs. And they could surely make it so certain cards are only available for certain time frames - or cost a premium when "out of print cycle" or whatever. Lots of ways to skin it.

My question was rhetorical.

Some people legitimately believe that a WOTC selling singles directly means $1 fetchlands for them.

[pokken]

Anyone who thinks wotc will do anything but charge what the market will bear is fooling themselves. See secret lair and masters sets and so on.

Sometimes they undershoot it while experimenting but they always get to charging as much as they can get away with. Obviously the rules designs, lore and artwork are the product here not the cardboard so I do take issue with the tendency to reduce it to cash for cardboard.

[onering]

Anyone who thinks wotc will do anything but charge what the market will bear is fooling themselves. See secret lair and masters sets and so on.

Sometimes they undershoot it while experimenting but they always get to charging as much as they can get away with. Obviously the rules designs, lore and artwork are the product here not the cardboard so I do take issue with the tendency to reduce it to cash for cardboard.

As much as they can get away with isn't actually some hard and fast single number. MSRP for a booster pack of a regular set remained steady from 2006-2019, when they abandoned msrp to let the market set prices, which was really just them acknowledging how Walmart et al were selling boosters and how game stores were selling limited run product like precons and FtV. In practice, boosters are still typically $3.99, give or take a quarter, and cheaper when they aren't one of the newest couple sets and retailers are trying to move them (or they get repacked in those green boxes 3 random packs 1-2 years old for $10). Even with $3.99 remaining the standard since 2006 (which is an insane amount of time for something to remain at a price point, only video games selling for $60 is really similar), a box of Ikoria, the newest set, sells for less than $100 for 36 packs, which amounts to around $2.75-$2.80 a pack, depending on the retailer.

Clearly, people buy boosters at Walmart for $4.15 plus tax, so why does wizards sell boxes for what amounts to $2.75 a pack (and actually, that's the third party selling it for that price, they definitely paid wizards less)? Because Wizards is not trying to sell the packs for as much as they can get, they are trying hit the sweet spot where the price curve and sales curve converge. The market will bear a higher price, but at the cost of sales. They may even be undercutting that sweet spot intentionally, aiming for a lower spot on the price curve to get the sales curve higher, and there would be many reasons for them to do that (maximizing profits short term being less important than maximizing growth in the player base to ensure a sustainable market, a focus on increasing market share vs competitors, using expansion boosters as a way to draw customers further into the brand and increase the likelihood they purchase other, higher profit offerings like secondary sets or non card merchandise, etc).

Pricing is, really, more of an arcane alchemy than an exact science. Lots of counter intuitive reasons lead to what companies charge. Uber and Lyft actually charge less than it takes to make a profit, and their business models are based on increasing market share and bankrupting traditional taxi companies in the hopes that they'll become monopolies, or one of two dominant players, and thus be able to charge outrageous rates while being able to drop them at a whim to crush any upstarts. There's plenty of companies that undercharge for their products and bleed money because of it yet see their stocks soar. Lots of them go under as well, so its always a mistake to assume that the companies know what they're doing when setting prices. The dumb ones think they do, the smart ones give it their best guess and keep checking to see if they're wrong. We can't see WotC books, so we can't say for sure what their strategy is, but from what I see it seems to be aggressively focused on expanding market share and sales while still being profitable. That is to say, I suspect that they could very well charge more for their products than they do and have it still be sustainable, the market would bear a higher price, but that they value larger growth in sales and acquisition of market share more.