Number of Releases and Frequency

[Sinis]

Line goes up.

I missed this at first, but... I got this reference.

[folding_music]

mmm half the old releases back in the day were miniature sets... like tempest was 305 or 330 cards long? but then stronghold and exodus are something like 143 cards. aaaand the base set that year had no new stuff in it either! now every set is big and redundant with multiple presentations, some of the cards locked inside different subset products, deliberately hard to collect. the sheer number of new cards to check a year has massively increased whichever metric you choose.

dunno, this isn't really my axe. my axe is whinier stuff like, if the game stayed in the same few planes you wouldn't have to create new versions of cards you wanna functionally reprint, you could just reprint them straight, and there should be more reprints anyway and less new cards and less of the new cards should be commons, there's already enough cards for a complete game that doesn't need any more expansions =P~

[5colorsrainbow]

I'm more in the mind that Dragonlover is with the difference is I do keep more of an eye on spoilers as they come out since I like the lore/world building and my melvin side likes seeing how magic sets are put together and structured. I also don't always find cards in sets I want. Out of the main set of New Capenna I want maybe a handful of cards* and I'm more into the stuff from the commander as the three color decks I have don't share the same themes as this set and/or are in other colors.

* there are certain cards I would certainly like to get but I don't have a huge need for them and the price is a little too much for me such as the tricycle lands

[Venedrex]

I must admit, I do find some of the ways you lot interact with the game fascinating. My approach is as follows:

Check spoilers every day on lunch/when I get home/ at random points/if someone points out they've updated. Probably takes about 15 minutes total out of my day.

Once the full set drops, go through the whole set with an eye to what I might need for my various EDH decks, and also a refresher for the prerelease. Probably takes a few hours, cause itll be alongside someone doing the same thing so conversation happens.

Do 1-5 prerelease events. Anything from an afternoon to a weekend.

Anything I don't open or trade for at the prerelease I'll buy as a single once my store has their stock sorted out, assuming I remember.

So yeah, actively thinking about a new set is at most two or three days of my life, the bulk of which is attending the prerelease that I would have attended anyway. Not exactly a burden.

I've never bought myself a Secret Lair because none have interested me enough, I don't buy all the precons because most of the time they don't interest me (being the new player on boarding ones) and I still manage to maintain my decks and occasionally brew a new one when the mood strikes. I also tend to ignore Masters sets since I'm looking for very specific reprints but only play EDH in terms of constructed, so I'll keep an eye on the spoiler but I'll generally skip the event.

Combine this approach with my agreement with "not every product is for me" as a philosophy, and you can hopefully understand why I just fundamentally don't understand some of the positions put forth in this thread. Other things on the not for me list include Un-sets and ancillary stuff like Spellbooks and Commander Collections, which I treat like Masters sets and Secret Lairs.

Dragonlover

Couldn't of put it better myself. To me I just like seeing new cards. It's like watching people open presents, they are not all for you but you can still be happy that someone got a cool new toy, and focus on what gifts you got and enjoy them. I go through all the spoilers, not because I feel like I have to, but because I want to. I also have no concerns about missing out on something good for a deck. If I missed something it will be more fun exploring it when I eventually brew the deck that card goes into.

Not to mention a lot of powerful or cool cards get played or showcased so chances are they will surface at some point in a Youtube video or a EDHREC article or a content creator tweet or wherever. Maybe I'm just uber-enfranchised but I really enjoy spoilers, and while I understand that it's been a tidal wave of stuff, as long as we're not swimming in broken garbage like Oko and Uro I'm happy to see it. I guess I just see new cards as content for my favorite game. As long as the content isn't unbalanced, keep it coming.

[onering]

I actually buy a decent number of precons still, to maintain a varies stable of unaltered precons that are roughly equivalent in power so my playgroup can play a round of precons if the first match ends early, and at least once a month.

Precons are fun. They're weak compared to modern commander decks but still pull off crazy plays, and it reminds me of the early days of commander. You have interaction, you play cool creatures, you do splashy stuff, and you don't have to worry about having to face anything kill on sight, and if someone runs away with the game they're either just better than everyone else or they got lucky. Everyone should have a couple unaltered precons, precon only games are a blast and you're missing out if you never play them.

[DirkGently]

@onering strong agree. Also worth noting that there's a lot fewer duds in newer precons than there used to be. The 2011 lists have a lot of "who the hell would play this in commander?" cards, like Orzhov Guildmage, Razorjaw Oni, Serra Angel, Oni of Wild Places...that's just in the mardu precon.

The torrential release cycle probably effects me more than almost anyone, as I try to acquire nearly every commander-viable card from every release. I've been slacking off a bit for the past couple years (and to be clear - I've still been playing a lot of limited for most of that, when COVID wasn't getting in the way), and ended up dropping $1,000+ to get all the cards I've missed.

[Yatsufusa]

Combine this approach with my agreement with "not every product is for me" as a philosophy, and you can hopefully understand why I just fundamentally don't understand some of the positions put forth in this thread. Other things on the not for me list include Un-sets and ancillary stuff like Spellbooks and Commander Collections, which I treat like Masters sets and Secret Lairs.

I think a lot of those positions come from a perspective of a "new deckbuilder personality", either someone going through that as a phase or (un)fortunately chronically like that for the format. People who are prone to building a new decks simply because of a new card/idea. There are several degrees of severity in the spectrum.

0) "I don't care" - People who literally cannot have a "new deckbuilder personality", not even when they started out. Somehow they just picked a precon/commander (some folks know what they're going from the get-go) and just stuck with it throughout their not-insubstantial time in the format (if it's insubstantial, I'd consider them more of just trying the game and not liking it rather than on this spectrum). Extremely rare, but they do exist.

1) "The honeymoon settler" - Arguably the most common type, a new player gets in, everything is new and they go around tinkering and spending, but after a while settles down like a "I don't care" for the rest of their time in the format, although that could be attributed to reduced priority for the game as we age (we also play less and less, but don't actually quit). The mileage of the tinkering period may vary, some folks could be done as fast as a month or less, while others may take a good few years, but when the key point is that they do settle. The actual percentage amongst all players may vary depending on how many new players there are, but just as a number I daresay this group will only get naturally bigger the older the game gets. Those who already settled are unlikely to be bothered by the torrent, but those still in the honeymoon phase might be suffering more than the predecessors (or conversely, enjoying more if they have more funds).

2) "Swanky new idea" - The folks who can't settle throughout, they must build a new deck if they something they deemed a novel new idea. Unlike the honeymoon settler, the variance isn't in the time, but in the severity of the quantity of different ideas they find interesting. Probably highly affected by this new era of torrent we're in, but some might choose to tone down/be more discerning about the ideas they find more interesting or even settle, especially when age/freedom also inevitably catches up, also potentially leading to "passive burnout" if a settler finds that suppressing ideas in the long run just made the game uninteresting to them.

3) "Slight change means big ideas" - Even worse than those who build on idea, folks that build on individual cards, even if the idea is similar to a previous one. A new commander costs 1 more than a previous one which is exactly the same but the new one has vigilance and is an elf, that means another deck! Folks here find the most miniscule of changes to qualify for a "new idea" (and hence another whole deck) whereas those of the previous category require a somewhat wider scope (an entire set mechanic, or something uniquely new in the game only on the card). Likely to be affected by "Vanilla with set's mechanic" a whole lot more severely than the above (which might at least discern whether the mechanic is worthy) and even more likely to think "every product is for me since everything is interesting". Also likely to get completely burnt out before they even have an inkling of rather "settling down" is an option. There's probably another layer than even differentiates by visual differences, not only functional, but those are way too rare I'd just note them here.