The product deluge vs Costs

[RxPhantom]

I don't have a lot of extra time in my life anymore. I've got a demanding job and a family. I get maybe every fourth Sunday. Luckily my LGS is opening back up after extensive remodeling and adding a brand new VR arena. I'm so hyped for tomorrow.

Magic itself may never truly be able to exit my life, regardless of how unpalatable WotC tries to make it.

[3drinks]

@3drinks when I say money is no object for the hypothetical, I mean NO object. Like, when a new product comes out, you get a box on your doorstep the next day with a playset of every new card. Consideration of value is irrelevant.

Then the answer is still no.

[BaronCappuccino]

I voted not bothered and money not an issue. I keep a single deck, a single Commander, at a time. If a new card doesn't inspire me to sell my current deck and build something new, and if it's not something my current deck wants, I ignore it. Right now, a card would need to be a wizard that counters, a modal spell with countering as one of its modes, a cost reducer like the medallion cycle or Baral, or a win con that's hand or library based- or maybe a non basic land. I get to ignore most things. WotC could print 14 sets a week so long as they remain irrelevant to me.

[Moxnix]

I don't have a lot of extra time in my life anymore. I've got a demanding job and a family. I get maybe every fourth Sunday. Luckily my LGS is opening back up after extensive remodeling and adding a brand new VR arena. I'm so hyped for tomorrow.

Magic itself may never truly be able to exit my life, regardless of how unpalatable WotC tries to make it.

I feel this all the money to get what I want none of the time to do half the things I want such is adult life.

[ISBPathfinder]

Just to put my own stance into perspective, the cost of this game largely doesn't matter for me. I have been playing 20+ years with commander for the last 14 and I own a very large collection. I am blessed to have a good job and very low expenses and have been working on my investing goals with very good results the last few years.

Largely the cost of this game doesn't matter but it is concerning because I can't keep track of what is coming out and when. My concern is more for the long term health of the game rather than the financial cost of it on my wallet. If I see negative trends in how the game is performing to some degree that feels like buying into a single stock company that you see is on its way down in a negative way. Seeing lots of red flags in product releases doesn't make me want to buy more magic product. I am not going to panic and hit the sell button on my collection but it doesn't endear me to want to buy more of it. It makes me want to turn into scrooge mc duck and tell wizards to get the hell out of my wallet.

I am lucky and in a situation though that if I wanted to I could monthly buy ABU duels (plural). Being an adult though I have better things to spend my money on than that but the cost of this game largely doesn't matter to me. Wizards is just doing bad things with their game and keeps giving me reasons to spend less and less. I think I drafted once in the last year and maybe opened packs like one other time. Outside of that its just been singles though. I hardly even support my LGS anymore in part because I just don't feel any connection to the owner who largely staffs it with teenagers.

[aliciaofthevast]

It's all just, like, kinda confusing tbh. Every week there's something new and I haven't digested it. It makes me want to tune out and go back to my PS2 or something. 😔

[toctheyounger]

It still irks me either way. And that's partly because it's not even remotely covert from WotC. They are absolutely force feeding us for profit, and whether you can stomach it or not it feels too much. I have a life and don't want to be constantly under deluge from new cards to parse and update. I'd actually really like my decks to get a minute to breathe before I need to consider updates yet again.

If money were no issue, I would still keep up with the lists as is, but it would still not sit well mentally.

[folding_music]

yeah there's the "feeling insulted" factor which is entirely separate from the "feeling outpriced" factor

[materpillar]

To follow up. Money isn't an issue for me at all anymore. I exclusively proxy new cards so I haven't paid money for anything not named limited in a couple of years.

That being said I looked over the Ixalan spoilers and all I feel is exhaustion. I've got my Changeling deck and I can barely keep up with it. They just printed three new pushed tribal commanders. I'm probably going to slot a few of them into the deck. While looking over potential cuts I realized I hadn't even gotten around to putting in the Dr Who stuff. I just want less stuff thrown at my brain every day.

[aliciaofthevast]

Most cards are side grades or just minuet upgrade, you probably won't even notice in most games anyway! Maybe this will help someone feel relief and not have to pore over new cards every 2½ weeks 👌

[Hermes_]

do you believe him?
MTG Designer Reveals Universes Beyond Won't Kill Normal Sets
https://mtgrocks.com/mtg-designer-revea ... 4Me3IB1mN4

[RxPhantom]

do you believe him?
MTG Designer Reveals Universes Beyond Won't Kill Normal Sets
https://mtgrocks.com/mtg-designer-revea ... 4Me3IB1mN4

I think he believes that, but I also remember saying that outside IPs would dilute Magic's identity,* but here we are.

*or something to that effect.

[5colorsrainbow]

I have some thoughts on the "will UB replace UW" but I'm getting ready for work and it might be worth making its own thread. TLDR; I don't think UB are sustainable as a resource to fully replace UW and far as I'm aware no UB has so far outsold UW sets by significant margins.

[Dunharrow]

I think I am busy enough that even if money was no object, it would barely affect me. I would buy more, but not a lot more. I am barely paying attention to new sets anymore. I do sealed on arena to introduce myself to the cards. I have no idea what is in the sets.
Supplemental products are getting close to zero attention.

I think there is a happy place between 4 standard sets, 1 commander product and 1 supplemental product a year (which is how it was for a long time) and whatever it is now.
I think we can handle about 8 products per year + the current rate of secret lair products. It's quite a lot. I would prefer they not release actual decks as secret lairs, it's not the right avenue for that.

But I think we are closer to 16 products in 2023? Wait more, how many jumpstarts are there per year?

[onering]

UB can %$#% right off. I hate that %$#% and it has made magic worse.

I only give a pass to the DnD sets because they're owned by the same company, Garfield imagined Magic as 30 minute DnD, and if DnD wasn't already a game and the setting was introduced as just another plane it would fit in perfectly fine (and better than New Capenna). I give a partial pass to LotR despite it's problems because the setting fits (though despite fitting well it's too iconic and it feels dumb summoning Legolas) and because it, like DnD, wasn't an extra release but replaced a realease that would normally be on the schedule (LotR and Forgotten Realms took the traditional core set slot, while Baldur's Gate was a commander legends set and took the special set slot, ie commander legends conspiracy etc).

[duducrash]

I voted not bothered and money not an issue. I keep a single deck, a single Commander, at a time. If a new card doesn't inspire me to sell my current deck and build something new, and if it's not something my current deck wants, I ignore it. Right now, a card would need to be a wizard that counters, a modal spell with countering as one of its modes, a cost reducer like the medallion cycle or Baral, or a win con that's hand or library based- or maybe a non basic land. I get to ignore most things. WotC could print 14 sets a week so long as they remain irrelevant to me.

I have good news for you! We just got a Supreme Will upgrade!

[BaronCappuccino]

I voted not bothered and money not an issue. I keep a single deck, a single Commander, at a time. If a new card doesn't inspire me to sell my current deck and build something new, and if it's not something my current deck wants, I ignore it. Right now, a card would need to be a wizard that counters, a modal spell with countering as one of its modes, a cost reducer like the medallion cycle or Baral, or a win con that's hand or library based- or maybe a non basic land. I get to ignore most things. WotC could print 14 sets a week so long as they remain irrelevant to me.

I have good news for you! We just got a Supreme Will upgrade!

Already incorporated into my Archidekt decklist and ready to preorder, if it's the one from Ixalan spoilers. Thanks for the heads-up.

[Cyberium]

We get cards to brew and build decks, so if the products come too rapidly it'd only hinder our deck building process. Brainstorming is best when WotC doesn't throw rocks into the motion.

[Hermes_]