Magic The Gathering Eternal Masters To Launch June 10th
May 12, 2016 by deltagamegirl22
My collector's gene is tingling as the month of June approaches. The next Masters set for Magic the Gathering from Wizards of the Coast is slated to release on June 10th. Eternal Masters will feature 249 cards that are some of the most sought after cards from Magic's history.
The Masters sets are intended to enhance your Cube, or Commander, Vintage or Legacy Decks. Some of the cards are straight up reprints, but others offer alternate art, which is a great little bonus for long time collectors.
These Master sets are definitely not cheap, but if you love the game and like to play it in a variety of formats, they do end up well worth the cost.
I treated myself to a box of Modern Masters 2015 last year and the box ended up worth more than twice its cost- so a pretty decent return.
What do you think about the Masters sets for Magic the Gathering and are you looking forward to Eternal?
"The Masters sets are intended to enhance your Cube, or Commander, Vintage or Legacy Decks..."
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This just in, Wizards of the Coast continues to print money.
But seriously Magic is getting big enough that it may start getting the kind of attention that competitive video games do soon. Only enough it hasn’t kept my interest in part because of the time it takes to get to event, but the other thing is the cost is getting… out of control. And this someone who has bought a GW kit for full retail.
Magic, in its current form, has reached its peak in terms of how much attention it gets.
Part of that problem is how dreadful the UI of Magic: Online is; if WotC had no competition, which I’d argue was the case 2-3 years ago, it wouldn’t be so bad, but unfortunately Hearthstone came along with its very slick presentation and has changed all of that
Hearthstone also has relatively simple rules that are easy to grasp, while Magic outside of Standard, is completely bonkers with regards to some of the rule interactions going on, which again makes it much easier to watch.
Hearthstone looks to always be in the top 3-5 on Twitch, and when the most recent expansion hit, I’m reasonable sure it was top (in fact, I think one broadcaster had viewers approaching 100k).
WotC are obviously aware of this and I’m 99% sure they’ve got something is in the works. I know the job of translating all of Mtg:O would be herculean but I suspect we’ll see a more streamlined version come out that perhaps only deals with Standard format (initially).
So far, I’ve only spoken about the online version, but there are a bunch of things in the physical version I’d argue need work on as well. If you want to build some of the more competitive decks, you’re looking at spending hundreds of £’s to build the mana base alone. The whole set-up with regards to Mythics / Rares seems to all be based around the 2nd hand market of selling these cards. For example that the expensive lands can’t be anything less than rare lest it upset all the 2nd hand sellers / collectors.
In fact, I’d wager it’s because of the 2nd hand market, that the MM sets have to be approx. twice the price of normal sets (a shame really, as MM draft tends to be a bunch of fun).
Then other things, like how they treat their judges, the pool prize money (despite Magic making about £300 million, they were going to reduce the amount), etc…
Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a “rant” how things are going to fall apart; as I’ve said, they’re making an absolute tonne of money and they’ve got an incredible set-up in terms of the support network (eg; Friday night magic, the release events), but I think WotC need to step it up a lot more than they are doing if they hope to become as popular as some of the other video games people like to watch.