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Mtg Arena Has Been Framed! Who Is the Real MTGO Killer?

Posted on December 11, 2018December 11, 2018 by Kyle Rusciano

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Magic Online has a problem. A card value problem. In a recent Channel Fireball article, Florian Koch showed just how much card prices have fallen over the past few years:

That's right. To own a playset of the cheapest version of every Magic card ever printed on MTGO would have cost you roughly $28,000 in September of 2016 before treasure chests were announced. One year later in September 2017 when Magic Arena was announced, that would have cost you roughly $22,500. Before Arena went into open beta September 2018, it would have cost you roughly $18,000. And now, roughly $14,000.

Although it's now cheaper to buy into MTGO than ever before, this precipitous decline is too much absolutely, and too much too quickly. As in paper Magic, players need to trust that their cards will have value in the long term for the market to be healthy.

Right now we are seeing many people upset that their Modern and Legacy collections on MTGO have lost so much value. Although the market on MTGO has not yet collapsed, it is in some danger of doing so; drastic action is needed – and fast. So many panic-stricken people sold their collections in response to the Channel Fireball article and Magic eSport news that Cardhoarder and MTGO Traders have temporarily suspended their collection buying.

While people and the market will come to their senses eventually – Magic Online will continue to be a platform that connects players to the new Mythic Championship series and provides the most affordable platform to play Modern, Legacy, Pauper, Vintage (and yes, Standard) – action is needed on Wizards's part, and specifically on MTGO Product Manager Alli Medwin's part, because the heart of the problem is that Treasure Chests, not Magic Arena, are predominantly responsible for causing this card value decline and making the Magic Online economy unhealthy.

Once you read his article, you can tell that that is the opinion of Koch as well (but the truth wouldn't have garnered so many clicks). The acceleration in the decline of prices is a necessary consequence of keeping treasure chest values fixed between 2 and 2.5 tix...it's an economic truth and has little to do with Arena. If there is less overall value in the economy, you have to take a higher percentage of the system's value to keep chests at that fixed price.

Consider this revised take of the Biblical account of Jesus creating loaves and fishes: let's say Jesus didn't want to give a loaf of bread to each hungry person, but rather $2.50 worth of bread to each hungry person. He figures he needs to make 5,000 loaves of bread to accomplish this, and so he miraculously creates 5,000 loaves of bread and gives them to all these hungry people. But now that the market has had that major influx of bread supply, the cost of bread declines, so the amount of bread Jesus has to give to the next wave of hungry people must go up if he wants to maintain his goal of giving $2.50 worth to each hungry person. Those 5,000 loaves will become 6,000, which puts more downward pressure on bread prices than the original influx of 5,000, so the next time will be 10,000, then 20,000, then 50,000, and eventually there will be so much bread that bread will become worthless and Jesus will have to drop his goal.

The moral of the parable is this: the amount of bread needed to be created and given away must increase at an accelerated pace to maintain the $2.50 figure, and likewise, the value of bread will consequently decline at an accelerated pace. Right now we are in the midst of that accelerated decline, and it is wreaking havoc on players' confidence in the MTGO economy and in the platform itself. Consider this an open letter to Alli Medwin. I'm here today to offer a few realistic longer-term solutions to keep the Magic Online economy healthy and strong.

Method I: The Treasure Chest Fix

The most straightforward solution is to change the contents of Treasure Chests (TCs). Right now, curated cards take up 10 percent of TC contents, random Modern rares or mythics take up 23 percent of TC contents, playpoints take up 10 percent of TC contents, and boosters take up 0 percent of TC contents. Ignoring the junk filler commons and uncommons, the value breakdown in TCs comes out to:

23% curated cards
53% random rare or mythic
23% playpoints
0% boosters

This means that roughly 76 percent of the prize support embedded inside TCs is value coming not from Wizards but from other MTGO users. Lee Sharpe, the inventor of TCs, is one wily fox, as he figured out a way to give players prize support without having it come from Wizards's pockets. Imagine if a casino forced all of its patrons to give it their credit card numbers, and then every time someone hit a jackpot or won a poker game. the casino paid out these winners by charging a little bit from all the other patrons' credit cards. That is what is happening here, and has been happening for two years now.

The constant downward pressure on the market and constant devaluation of collection values thus caused must end if MTGO is to be saved. This method of prize support depends on an ever-growing user base to stave off collapse – it is not internally stable or sound in a closed system.

To be blunt: play points and boosters need their percentage increased, and curated cards and Modern mythics and rares need their percentage decreased. As I mentioned last week, Magic Arena has reduced the overall amount of drafting done on MTGO, so lower booster prices would help make drafting more attractive and increase demand. I'd propose:

10% curated cards
30% random rare or mythic
45% playpoints
15% boosters

This would cut the amount of non-redeemable product flooding into the system by at least 35 to 50 percent. That might not be enough, but this change would go a long way toward saving MTGO.

Method 2: The Dusting Fix

Another remedy to too many cards flooding the market is to take cards out of the market. A dusting system for bulk cards introduced alongside Method 1 would further ease the downward pressure on the market. If Magic players were allowed to dust some number of rares/mythics, uncommons, and commons into play points or tickets, that would clear out some excess supply and would help keep some of the chest contents more valuable over time.

Method 3: Remove Cards from the System

I know, I know. "We don't have the developmental resources to implement a dusting system." That's fine Alli, no problem! Set up some official Wizards bots that will pay 1 tix for 400 commons, 200 uncommons, 100 rares, or 50 mythics. Get cards out of the system that way.

Also....have y'all seen how many treasure chests there are in the system? Look at GoatBots glutted inventory.

If these chests weren't tradeable, the economy would have already collapsed. Use these Wizards bots to buy chests for 2.25 tix each. Or let them be used for a while as currency to enter events. Get them out of the system.

A lot of chests are also pumped into the system through the weekend Format Challenges, so it'd be a good idea to reduce the number of treasure chests given as payout. Replace some of the treasure chests with real money and boxes of physical product like Ultimate Masters and Guilds of Ravnica.

Method 4: The Time Fix

Alli Medwin could also take a page from the Arena playbook and reward players in the currency of time. Arena has taught us at least one thing -- players want to be able to play more digital Magic for their dollar. Right now MTGO offers no way for players to enter into leagues or drafts without paying some sort of fee -- the platform is built around a tournament gameplay model.

One way to give players more game time for the same price would be to give players a free entry to an event every ten events they enter (perhaps reducing the amount of compensation slightly to compensate). Say, as part of the reward for participating in any event players receive a "phantom token," ten of which can be redeemed to enter any event. If we want to push this idea further, we could increase the number of free entries given to players but preclude them from winning prizes when they enter with phantom tokens – the reward would exclusively be playing more Magic (and without added stress!).

There are many different ways to take this concept and run with it. I personally came up with this method when thinking that Limited players should be awarded a phantom token after each Guilds of Ravnica Sealed or Draft event, ten of which could be redeemed for a Cube or Flashback draft entry. But what makes this method a part of a potential solution to the value problem is that it slows down the rate that treasure chests are pumped into the system.

At any rate, the key take away is that players need to be rewarded in ways other than non-redeemable product. Reward them with more Magic. Reward them with play points. Reward them with redeemable product. But for the love of God, for the sake of the MTGO platform, for the sake of your long-term profits, and for your appreciation and respect for MTGO players, stop rewarding them with more Explorations and Noble Hierarchs than the market can bear. Arena has given you an opening here, as Limited demand has gone down even as Constructed demand has stayed the same or increased. Shift the contents of treasure chests accordingly – only strong and immediate action will re-instill confidence into the marketplace and make the economy fundamentally healthy again.

Wrapping it Up

Thank you for reading. This week we will hear details about how MTGO is connected to the paper Mythic Championships, which is something I had expected but needed to hear from the horse's mouth. This is something that will give me and others renewed confidence in Magic Online and will make me likely to continue to be an investor on the platform.

I haven't made any buys since late September, but by the time this article goes live, I likely will have started investing in MTGO again. There's never been a better time to buy, and if any of my Arena readers are interested in Modern or Pauper, now is your chance to buy a deck for cheap. This also means Guilds of Ravnica financial power rankings will be coming your way as a Christmas treat, so stay tuned for that! Please don't hesitate to hit me up on Discord or in the comment section below with any questions and comments.

The Rise of the Alpha Rare (Continued)

Posted on December 10, 2018December 10, 2018 by Sigmund Ausfresser

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Last week I tried something different with my weekly column. I dug up a relevant article from the past—one that probably goes back before most readers were visiting this site—and provided some new perspective. Oftentimes the articles I write are evergreen, and with just some minor touch-ups can be just as useful today as they were years ago.

Because I received positive feedback on this new approach, I wanted to resurrect another piece I wrote. This one is even older: it goes all the way back to May of 2012. That's over six and a half years old! The article is about Alpha rares, and how they are an asset on their own due to their collectibility and rarity as opposed to player demand. The near mint versions are especially rare, and should be compared to artwork more so than gaming pieces.

The strategies mentioned in this article have paid off fantastically and I think they're just as valid today. I'll update some prices where relevant in the column below; new text will be in bold italics.

A couple weeks ago, the iconic painting “The Scream” by Edvard Munch sold at auction for a whopping $119,922,500. This placed Munch over Picasso in history as the artist with the most expensive piece of artwork ever sold. My reaction can best be encompassed by the central figure in the painting itself:

That is an incredibly large sum of money for a piece of artwork. No matter how much of a classic this painting is, it’s highly unlikely Munch could have ever imagined his work would fetch such a large sum a hundred years later.

What’s This Got To Do With Magic?

The iconic Alpha Black Lotus has appreciated significantly since its initial printing (albeit not to $119 Million). When I first began playing Magic, this card fetched around $300. As a newcomer to the game with no income on days other than my birthday and Christmas, this price seemed way too steep for a piece of cardboard.

Now, nearly twenty years later, circulated copies of this iconic Magic: the Gathering card have sold at auction for amounts in excess of $3,000—an increase of 1,000%! The only completed eBay listing for an Alpha Black Lotus is a rough one that sold back in November for around $15,000. From 1997 to today, that's an increase of 4,900%. The returns keep getting better and better!

But these versions are circulated—they have seen play and they likely continue to see play in Vintage decks. There are far rarer versions of the Alpha Black Lotus—ones which are virtually unplayed in condition.

In fact the PSA-10 Mint Alpha Black Lotus has sold for upwards of $20,000 in previous sales. The [supposed] only one in existence is now for sale on eBay with an asking price of $100,000. Crazy? Yes! Crazier than paying $119 Million for a painting? Perhaps not. Card Kingdom has a near mint price of $40,000 for an Alpha Lotus, and that's not likely to be PSA 10. So I think a PSA 10 Alpha Lotus has got to be worth $100,000 or even more at this point.

NM Alpha vs. SP Alpha

Based on the most widely accepted numbers, each Alpha rare was printed about 1100 times by Wizards of the Coast. This count places any rare from Alpha high up on the list of rarest Magic: the Gathering cards.

But given these cards are nearly twenty years old, and most were played to oblivion, the subset of NM rare Alpha cards is even more elite. While it is impossible to garner exact numbers, even a generous fraction such as 10% NM would imply there are only about 100 copies of any NM Alpha rare card in existence.

Retailers have caught on to this fact—back in April, Star City Games significantly increased their buy and sell prices on NM Alpha/Beta cards only. They purposefully emphasize in their buylist that one should inquire about buylist prices for SP and MP copies. When we observe SCG is selling NM versions of Alpha rares at 2x the price of SP versions, we can certainly see why they’ve created this discrepancy.

But we don’t even have to lay out $20,000 to own a unique piece. Many NM Alpha rares are relatively much more affordable, yet they are still very rare and demand a healthy premium. NM copies of the five Laces from Alpha, for example, sell for $100 on Star City Games and they are even sold out of some! Consider Lifelace, which is about as playable as Song of Blood, yet far rarer and more expensive. Star City Games is (not surprisingly) sold out of Alpha Lifelace, but their near mint price is now $249.99. It's incredible that such an unplayable card can still more than double in price over six years' time.

Even though the card is not useful in tournament or casual settings, the simple rarity of the NM Alpha Lifelace has driven its price up to surprising proportions. The card sells at 200x its 4th Edition price (now 500x), and it even far out-shadows the Beta version, which sells for only about one eighth the Alpha price. This is one difference between today and six years ago: Beta rares have caught up to their Alpha counterparts. Now a Beta Lifelace retails for only about one-third an Alpha copy. After all, near mint Beta rares are extremely rare as well.

An even more bizarre example lies in that pesky creature Fungusaur. That’s right, I said Fungusaur. Check out Star City Games’s sell price on that unplayable Alpha rare in NM form:

Anyone who has been playing this game long enough has opened one of these rares, and I’d even go out on a limb to say that virtually none of us were ecstatic to open this “crap rare.” Yet grab a NM Alpha copy of this beloved Fungus Lizard and you’ve got yourself a card that retails for $200! I’d wager a graded version with PSA score 8 or above may be even more expensive! These now retail for $349.99...I wonder if the same person is still collecting these or if they've return to circulation?

How could the Alpha version of this card be so expensive when it is so unplayable? My theory may surprise you…

Cornering the Market

Apparently there is a collector out there who owns at least 85 copies of Alpha Fungusaur. This picture is worth 1,000 words and well over $1,000:

Own 85 copies of almost any card in the game of Magic—even something like foil Jace, the Mind Sculptor—and you still haven’t even scratched the surface of the total quantity in circulation. Own 85 copies of any Alpha rare, however, and you can officially manipulate the market.

These 85 Alpha Fungusaurs represent nearly 10% of the total quantity ever printed. This single collector likely owns more Alpha copies than the largest 10 MTG retailers combined. The largest retailer in the world, Star City Games, boasts 14 copies for sale at the moment—about one sixth of what is pictured above.

When print runs are so few, price manipulation is a possibility. One could even “corner the market” in a particular Alpha rare. In other words, acquiring only 85 copies of an Alpha rare, no matter the card, is sufficient to manipulate the card’s price. As a result, a major retailer like Star City Games sells this unplayable card at twice the price as its unplayable counterparts in Alpha. And again, NM copies take the cake, selling at $50 higher than SP versions. Fungusaur isn't the only Alpha card being collected. A while ago, a number of people were attempting to collect 5% of a given Alpha card's print run. I'm not sure how many of these collections are still intact, but I'd wager it's nonzero. This is probably still a thing.

What Should We Do With This Information?

I strongly discourage you from attempting to corner the market in any of these rare cards. To do so is very risky, and profiting from the endeavor is not easy. Attempt to sell a significant quantity of stock and you’ll likely kill the price, rendering the remainder of your collection worth far less.

Still, there is something to be learned here. NM Alpha rares are incredibly difficult to acquire. Some retailers, like ABU Games, have known this for a while now. Others, like Star City Games, are finally catching on and altering their prices to reflect this. Still other retailers such as Troll and Toad, as well as smaller eBay sellers, have not fully embraced this information. By now every retailer that cares about older cards has caught on that Alpha rares in near mint condition are extremely scarce.

As a result I've managed to snag not one, but two NM Alpha Two-Headed Giant of Foriys from a well-known retailer at the reasonable price of $55.99. This seems like a steep price to pay for another unplayable card, but a quick visit to Star City Games’s buylist and you’ll see that they are buying NM copies of this oldie for $60. Hence, I made an immediate $8 profit between the two copies I purchased. I wish I had kept this card! I flipped it for arbitrage, but now buylist is $420. I could have made far more than $8!

These opportunities are out there. One other recent acquisition I made was a sweet PSA-8 graded Alpha Earthquake for $59.00. Although not pristine enough to command a major premium, Star City Games will still buy the card at $60 and sell at $100. This one is even more painful! Earthquake is played in Old School and now buylists for $550. I had a few Alpha cards like this. And while I wish I had exercised more patience, keeping them for the long term, I must acknowledge the fact that gains from my near mint Alpha investments helped me in acquiring my Unlimited Black Lotus. It's all about prioritization I suppose.

But the overall goal isn’t to make $1 here and there selling cards to retailers’ buylists. Instead, I want you to consider the long haul. An unplayable NM Alpha rare may never reach the same prices as a Black Lotus, but collectors looking to complete their sets will need one Fungusaur for every Black Lotus. With Magic growing in popularity, combined with the fact that Alpha cards are perpetually aging, we have a recipe for significant gains.

Cards that once fetched pennies are now selling for $100. Could the growth rate continue? Will there be a point in time when NM Alpha Fungusaurs are so difficult to find that they will break four-digit prices? Graded ones may… This is the crux of my article: I believe this approach is just as valid today as it was back in 2012. Alpha rares are only getting harder to find as collectors absorb more and more copies. Barring a total collapse of Magic, these remain solid investments for the long-term.

These rarities don’t follow the normal ebb and flow of pricing like normal Magic cards do. Instead of moving trajectories comparable to the stock market, they instead follow paths resembled by classic artwork. Incredibly sparse, NM Alpha rares (especially graded highly) can grow in price at astronomical rates as long as there is a market for them.

Perhaps five years down the line I will have my NM Alpha Two-Headed Giants graded in hopes of a boost in value (facepalm...wish I kept it 5 years!). They may never be worth as much as a NM Black Lotus, but one thing is for certain—if Star City Games feels they are worth acquiring at $60 each, I am certainly going to acquire them below that price any chance I can get.

You may want to consider the same.

-Sigmund Ausfresser
@sigfig8

I had no Sigbits segment six-and-a-half years ago. So let's take a look at some surprising Alpha numbers from this week in 2018.

Funny enough, the Alpha rare with the lowest buylist on Trader Tools is none other than Lifelace: $125. Considering these were buylisting for $60 6.5 years ago, it's still impressive to see the price more than double since. I don't think it's a remotely bold prediction to say these will buylist for over $250 in 2015. The trajectory is practically a given unless paper Magic dies.

Thanks to the rise of Old School, popular cards from the format have really skyrocketed the most since 2012. Consider Chaos Orb, for example, which now buylists for $4200. According to Trader Tools, the best buylist back in mid-2012 was $171. Now THAT'S a good return on investment!

There was an error retrieving a chart for Chaos Orb

The Alpha card with the best spread on Trader Tools is Demonic Hordes. It currently has a buylist price of $720 but TCG Mid is listed at $300. Obviously you can't find a nice copy for $300 anymore—this is likely the last copy that sold on TCGplayer. I believe this is a reflection of the rate of price change on these cards. The price jumped so quickly that copies were never even listed between $300 and $720. If they were, they would have sold and TCG's pricing would have reflected as much. These cards really went through an exponential growth period, though now prices have settled a bit. This is likely a temporary respite, however, and I expect prices to soar yet again at some point.

Bonus aside: Here's another Alpha article written by Chas Andres from 2012, with some amusing prices cited. I wish I had bought so much more Alpha back then.

In Guild Faith: Building a Better Midrange

Posted on December 7, 2018 by Jordan Boisvert

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It's easy to identify with Ravnica's guilds. The plane owes much of its popularity to that simple fact. In Modern, where color fixing is better than any other constructed format, players have more often aligned themselves with shards or wedges, such as Jund and Jeskai. But these days, decks tend to be defined less by their colors than by their engines or synergies.

Today, as we nostalgically await the first spoilers for Guilds of Ravnica's follow-up expansion, we'll harken back to a simpler time. A time when Modern players readily associated with a shard or a guild. A time when midrange decks sharing names with such factions were actually good.

The Problems with Midrange

Stumbling upon a recent forum post inspired me to reconsider my previous stance on midrange in Modern (that it's not dead). Especially since the rise of Arclight Phoenix, midrange decks—here defined as aggro-control hybrids that disrupt opponents, then commit threats to the board—seem to have tapered off, despite occasional (innovative) showings in 5-0 dumps. In this section, we'll enumerate the three chief failings of midrange.

1. Creatures Outclassed

Tarmogoyf once stood tall as the strongest creature in Modern by a mile, as well as the most-played. Not coincidentally, midrange decks contracting the monster dominated Modern for years, challenged primarily by now-banned decks.

Eldrazi creatures were the first to rival Goyf's red-zone efficiency, and Fatal Push further jostled the Lhurgoyf's standing among combat creatures. Since then, a plethora of creatures have been printed or enabled that do more than just brawl (Spell Queller, Thing in the Ice), or that trump Goyf on mana efficiency (Hollow One, Arclight Phoenix).

Midrange decks have largely failed to take advantage of such creatures as aggro decks have. The two exceptions are Death's Shadow, which is both cheaper and frequently huger than big brother Goyf, and Bedlam Reveler, whose cannibalistic graveyard reliance further ostracizes the fallen king. As their employable threats became weaker relative to Modern's, midrange decks plummeted in stock.

2. Consistency in Chaos

Between Fatal Push, Thoughtseize, Collective Brutality, Assassin's Trophy, and others, midrange decks enjoy an embarrassment of riches when it comes to disruption. What they don't enjoy is finding each answer at the right time, a task exceedingly daunting in a format notorious for banning in-game consistency tools.

Available options are limited: Grim Flayer (a squishier, less-splashable Tarmogoyf); Traverse the Ulvenwald (I, too, lose to Rest in Peace); Serum Visions (enjoy your durdle); Ancient Stirrings (kiss most of your core goodbye); and Faithless Looting (welcome to red, and to minus-ones). The latter three see plenty of play, but only Looting helms a midrange deck: Mardu Pyromancer. And even still, results indicate the card is more at home in aggro-combo.

At the end of the day, existing consistency tools are far better at finding (and accelerating into) threats than they are answers. It stands to reason that midrange decks have much to gain from ditching their slower elements and embracing aggression. The consistency issue is exacerbated by midrange's innately high land count, which makes it prone to flooding in the mid-game; upping aggression helps on this front, as well.

3. Suffering Splash Hate

Tarmogoyf; Grim Flayer. Heck, Bedlam Reveler. Lingering Souls! What do all these staple midrange threats have in common? They rely on the graveyard. In a format where the top-performing decks are aggro-combo strategies that also rely on the graveyard, this predicament opens midrange up to splash hate from just about everyone. Buff threats that resist graveyard hate form yet another missing piece of midrange's Modern puzzle.

What Do?

Can midrange reclaim Tier 1 status in Modern? I decided to uncover the true limitations of aggro-control's slower breeds with a unique deckbuilding exercise. The top-down approach I utilized involves addressing midrange's issues out of the gate, and filling out the list next.

Aligning with a Guild

Best generic card selection spell in Modern? Faithless Looting.
Best generic disruption spell in Modern? Lightning Bolt.

These two points informed my first decision, which was to go red. But my eight-card core still had to fill 52 more spots. This deck would need two things:

A way to close out the game. I wanted my threats impervious enough to Modern's current hosers that they could tangle with the velocity decks on a resilience metric, but still proactive enough to close out games against the combo decks.
A way to monetize Faithless Looting. An inherent minus-one, Looting is mostly worth it when it breaks even (or goes up) on card economy.

To decide which guild (or even shard/wedge) I'd align with, I scrutinized what each color brought to the table in terms of threats, utility, and disruption.

On-Color (R)

Many options already exist in red, and we are seeing some contemporary Looting/Bolt decks neglect to splash altogether.

Threats: Monastery Swiftspear, Runaway Steam-Kin, Young Pyromancer, Arclight Phoenix, Bedlam Reveler

Swiftspear is best supported alongside a cast of burn spells, and with his buddy Soul-Scar Mage. That direction already pulls us deeper into aggro-combo than aggro-control, and the same goes for Runaway Steam-Kin; these are not creatures meant to take over a game after opponents have been destabilized.

Young Pyromancer shines with targeted discard to ensure his fragile body sticks around and provide some quick bursts of value after resolving, so it's more of a black threat in this shell.

That leaves Arclight and Bedlam, the red threats seeing the most play beside Looting/Bolt. These threats compliment each other frighteningly well, occupying suitably distinct spots on the strategic curve and attacking opponents from myriad angles (Arclight flies, hastes, and recurs; Reveler walls, swells, and refills). Aggro-control decks wielding both already exist, dipping into blue for extra cantrips and Thing in the Ice. But those decks trend more tempo than midrange, and also toe the aggro-combo line, making them unrecognizable as rock decks. They're closer in spirit to thresh, and even more to grow, especially the Grow-a-Tog decks of Vintage past.

Color takeaways: As the available options push us into tempo and aggro-combo, we'll have to look outside of red to build our midrange deck.

Izzet (U/R)

The uninhibited guild of creative freedom, Izzet indeed offers our eight-card core multiple considerations.

Threats: Delver of Secrets, Thing in the Ice, Crackling Drake

Delver, again, is too low on the curve to serve a midrange deck. Conversely, Crackling Drake is quite high, but I think one of the more appealing options as a closer; it's a one-to-three-turn clock, difficult to remove, and critically self-replacing in sloggy pseudo-mirrors.

The threat that synergizes best with Bolt and Looting, though, is Thing in the Ice. Thing performs multiple functions at once: pilots don't need to dedicate too many slots to removal, as it handles entire boards of creatures by itself; they also don't need to load up on aggression, since Thing hits like a truck.

As such, Thing proves exquisitely compact, letting players fill out their decks with cards that bring it from viable to insane. A shell full of cantrips and Manamorphose is not only poised to make exceptional use of Arclight/Reveler, but threatens to flip Thing in the Ice on turn three with pinpoint accuracy, significantly improving Izzet's proactive capabilities. If all that wasn't enough, Thing supports Arclight/Reveler by evading graveyard hate itself.

Sound great? It is. But midrange it ain't.

Utility: Serum Visions, Opt, Chart a Course, permission

Beyond threats, blue offers our deck additional cantrips and countermagic, not that we need to indulge it if we're fast enough.

Guild takeaways: As with mono-red, we won't have much success building midrange in these colors.

Rakdos (B/R)

The reckless guild of ruin, Rakdos has little regard for anything but its own goals. Ironically, this splash offers us blue-chip interaction.

Threats: Death's Shadow, Tasigur, the Golden Fang/Gurmag Angler, Young Pyromancer

Death's Shadow heavily taxes our life count and shoves us towards aggro-combo with Temur Battle Rage, although the card already enjoys minor success in the rock shell of Traverse Shadow. Tasigur and Angler are relatively unimpressive in Modern right now, being outpaced by the faster aggro decks and suffering from splash damage aimed at those same decks. As mentioned above, Young Pyromancer is an intriguing option given this splash, but we'd have to take care not to build a worse Mardu Pyromancer.

Utility: Liliana of the Veil, Liliana, the Last Hope

While these walkers have their uses in certain matchups, I've come to believe that both of them are too specific for successful mainboard use outside of currently-underperforming strategies (i.e. Jund), and only Last Hope is impactful enough for the side. Their steep color requirements also hurt.

Disruption: Inquisition of Kozilek/Thoughtseize, Fatal Push, Collective Brutality

These cards all represent the most universal ways to disrupt opponents before committing pressure to the board, making them perfect for midrange decks.

Guild takeaways: Black's superb disruption could assist us, but we'd still be lacking pressure. Going the Mardu route with Reveler/Souls just opens us to splash graveyard hate.

Boros (W/R)

Fusing colors of transparency, honor, and impulse, Boros is perhaps Ravinca's most patriotic guild (oh, Canada!). White's never been known for its aggressive elements, but it offers us the most devastating sideboard cards... assuming we're not soft to them ourselves.

Disruption: Path to Exile, Rest in Peace, Stony Silence, Suppression Field

Path gives us a Push-esque way to remove troublesome creatures, and is doubly effective at sniping recursive threats like Phoenix. The real draw to this disruption suite, though, is Rest in Peace, which pundits are (correctly) claiming is now useful enough to merit mainboard play. Hosing artifact-based aggro-combo and pure combo alike, Stony Silence is also receiving the red carpet treatment from content producers.

Guild takeaways: We'd go Boros for the hosers, forcing our strategy to at once mitigate the damage from Rest in Peace and extract value from Looting. A tall order!

Gruul (G/R)

Gruul is the instinctual guild of bodybuilding—muscle and dorks. But Goyf ain't the Mr. Universe he used to be.

Threats: Tarmoyof

I stood by the Big Man after Fatal Push, but the new wave of aggro-combo decks and their demand for graveyard hate have all but antiquated this beater.

Utility: Traverse the Ulvenwald, Scavenging Ooze, Tireless Tracker, Huntmaster of the Fells

In other words, exactly the kind of clunk that bogs down today's attempts at midrange, and a tutor to find them with.

Guild takeaways: In my eyes, green is no longer a discard spell's best friend. Goyf's is the color of sweeper-soft creature-combo.

Colorless (😏)

As I defeatedly stared at my completed list of red guilds and their respective benefits, I realized one faction was missing, just as it is from Ravnica. Before aggro-combo's resurgence, the Eldrazi provided the first true alternative to Goyf's bulk in a disrupt-then-commit aggro strategy.

Threats: Eldrazi Mimic, Eternal Scourge, Thought-Knot Seer, Reality Smasher, Hollow One

Look at that—an entire curve! So much for treading water until we find our single acceptable threat in a given color. The bigger creatures make a unit of Mimic when we need pressure, and out-Goyf the Lhurgoyf when we don't. Scourge also allows for some neat tricks, as we know.

The above catalog includes one non-Eldrazi colorless creature: Hollow One. Hollow works with Faithless Looting, but requests a little more discard to be reliable; the proven loot effects, Burning Inquiry and Goblin Lore, tend to be too random in their discards to excel in a midrange deck. Not so with Street Wraith, which rewards a fetchless manabase and perhaps enables One when combined with Looting alone. The Golem also has tickling explosiveness applications with Eldrazi Mimic.

Color(less) takeaways: Running Eldrazi necessitates Eldrazi Temple, and subsequently does a number on our mana. Conveniently, the tribe avoids many common hate cards, and can even run them itself.

Stick 2 My Gunz

What can I say? I'm a meathead. Here's where I landed.

Boros Eldrazi Stompy, by Jordan Boisvert

Creatures

4 Eldrazi Mimic

4 Eternal Scourge

4 Thought-Knot Seer

4 Reality Smasher

4 Hollow One

4 Simian Spirit Guide

4 Street Wraith

Arttifacts

2 Smuggler's Copter

Enchantments

2 Rest in Peace

Instants

4 Lightning Bolt

Sorceries

4 Faithless Looting

Lands

4 Eldrazi Temple

4 Battlefield Forge

4 Ramunap Ruins

3 Sacred Foundry

3 Mutavault

1 Plains

1 Mountain

Sideboard

2 Rest in Peace

3 Stony Silence

2 Damping Sphere

2 Engineered Explosives

2 Abrade

2 Dismember

2 Anger of the Gods

There are a few interesting things going on in this list, so I'll address each of those in their own section.

Hollow One Package

4 Faithless Looting
4 Street Wraith
4 Hollow One

We were already in Looting, so Hollow wasn't so hard to accommodate. I started without this package, but found myself too slow to adequately pressure aggro-combo without Chalice of the Void to disrupt them. Of course, Looting and Bolt prevent us from using Chalice, so our other option was to seize some speed ourselves. Smuggler's Copter too helps cast Hollow One.

Four Guides

No Chalice here. Not even a Blood Moon. But just as Street Wraith supports Looting as a necessary evil for Hollow One, so does Guide support Temple for casting Eldrazi. Our creatures are solid, but they are slow, or at least slower than most of what Modern's doing right now. We need them to resolve early enough to win us the game.

We can also just tap three lands for Guide and get our Grey Ogre on.

Mainboard Rest in Peace

The first draft got value out of Eternal Scourge with 4 Serum Powder. It was better at finding Temple, too, but disjointed overall; it stretched hands featuring both Eldrazi and Hollow elements precariously thin. As a midrange deck, I found myself wanting to keep many slower hands that included Powder, and eventually cut the artifact.

Now, I've taken Riley Knight's would-be advice and moved 2 Rest in Peace from side to main. Not only do they fulfill their literal purpose as hosers and free-win generators, they allow us to extract value out of both Scourge and Faithless Looting without fearing graveyard hate. Achievement unlocked! We simply discard Scourge to Looting or Copter, and a resolved Rest in Peace functionally draws them again. Rest's continuous effect on the battlefield also offsets the loss of Looting's back end, since when Scourge dies, it automatically rejoins our pool of castables. And when Rest is really bad, we can just Loot it away.

The Manabase

We're mostly a red Eldrazi deck, so our white sources are limited. I'd add more if we had better options available (Battlefield Forge 5-8), and may trim a Mutavault for the fourth Sacred Foundry. Vault is the best utility land (besides Zhalfirin Void) in Colorless Eldrazi Stompy right now, but between Looting flashback, pricey Hollows, and Sourge/Rest, we have lots to do with our mana already.

Ramunap Ruins is incredible. I had to see it in action to believe it, but the card has already won me multiple games.

Omissions

Serum Powder: See above.
Blood Moon: Tampers too much with our mana, especially without Powder. Also a bit slow. Rest in Peace is the superior lock piece here.
Thalia, Guaridan of Thraben: A possible sideboard include, but we've got no space in the main.
Eldrazi Displacer: Incredibly slow. We already win the value game with Scourge.
Eldrazi Obligator: Also slow, and useless against a large portion of decks. Gone are the days of Goyfs and Gurmags. No way can we fit this guy.
Dismember: I think Bolt is enough removal for the main, and enjoy having so much reach in an aggro deck.
Zhalfirin Void: Not impactful enough at 2 copies, which is all the space we have. There's also less chaff to sort through without Powder in the deck.

The Sideboard

Rest in Peace: We want multiple copies against the decks we bring it in against, since they aggressively mulligan into answers for it.
Stony Silence: Same deal.
Damping Sphere: Improves in multiples, and is one of the most effective ways to attack velocity-based decks. Also helps vs. Tron.
Abrade: An all-star in the Hollow One mirror, and fine against most creature decks.
Dismember: Mostly a concession to Thing in the Ice, which can be forever-blocked by Scourge/Rest but is very annoying combined with reach.
Anger of the Gods: The sweeper effect Colorless has always wanted. RR is accessible with this manabase and 4 Guide, and we don't play Matter Reshaper.

Clunking through the City

Is Boros Eldrazi Stompy better than Colorless Eldrazi Stompy? Probably not. It's certainly not as finely tuned. But I think the principles applied in its creation might help some more dedicated souls elevate midrange to its former heights. Until then, may you race with valor—and, no matter which free creatures you elect to dump into play, never forget who you are.

MTG Questions: What’s an Easy Way to Sell Bulk?

Posted on December 7, 2018December 10, 2018 by Edward Eng

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This is the first article from my new series, MTG Questions. You might be familiar with the Hold ‘Em & Fold ‘Em series (rebranded as MTG Metagame Finance), which takes a tournament-oriented perspective. I decided to start this series to focus on more general aspects of MTG finance. The two series will work together, as when interesting categories pop up when I write for the MTG Metagame Finance series, this series will give me a chance to go a little deeper on those topics.

For example, in Hold ‘Em & Fold ‘Em #21, I featured another buylist order to Card Kingdom. However, this buylist was a bit different than previous buylists because the process I used changed. First off, my first buylist order to Card Kingdom was featured in Hold ‘Em & Fold ‘Em #16. As a result, some people in the Quiet Speculation’s Discord channel asked why I didn’t use something like Trade Routes from Quiet Speculation’s Trader Tools to find the best buylist prices on some of the cards. But as I mentioned in the article, I didn’t want to go through the hassle of trying to sell through multiple channels because my time is limited. Many of you probably know about the time value of money. However, the money value of time is just as important, if not more.

And although I knew I was leaving some money on the table, I told myself that I would eventually dive into Quiet Speculation’s Trader Tools, and I recently had a chance to do so.

I can’t quite remember, but I think I started doing some research on Magic apps and stumbled across MTG Manager. It looked like something that I could use to keep track of my collection digitally and also help me with creating a spreadsheet for Quiet Speculation’s Trader Tools to use in order to help me not leave so much money on the table.

I quickly fell in love with MTG Manager. The interface and user experience is nice. And as I was using the app to catalog my collection/inventory, I noticed some areas of potential improvement. I jotted all those notes down and contacted the company. They got back to me right away saying a new version will be coming out soon as they’ve been working on a lot of the notes I jotted down. Awesome!

Once I cataloged most of my cards, I tried using the export function to send myself a spreadsheet of the bulk folder I created. It worked very nicely. From there, I was able to easily start using Trade Routes from Quiet Speculation’s Trader Tools by importing the spreadsheet I downloaded from MTG Manager.

The process was pretty easy too. I just had to format the spreadsheet a little bit and – BOOM! – I could suddenly see which companies had the best buylist prices for my bulk. Awesome!

Next, I went to Card Kingdom and created my buylist order. And within a few minutes, my next buylist order was done. Awesome!

I’m looking forward to possibly doing this again with some of my speculation folders and cards. But for now, I’m interested in learning if this article was helpful for you or if you have any questions.

Reach out to me in the comments below. You can also connect with me on Twitter at @edwardeng. I’m also open to suggestions on how to make this series more valuable. Hit me up. Thanks!

Have fun,
Eddie

Preparing for the December 6th Announcement

Posted on December 6, 2018December 17, 2018 by Kyle Rusciano

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Welcome back, folks.

It's been a while since I last wrote an article, in large part because I've been unwilling to make any financial moves on MTGO before reading the December 6th announcement about competitive play on Arena. What is announced there could have major ramifications for investing on MTGO, and so I've been very cautious. That's why I haven't yet published a Guilds of Ravnica Financial Power Rankings article, and in general have been reluctant to encourage folks to make any investments given this uncertainty.

I. Limited Play on Arena and MTGO

Arena has had an effect on MTGO, but not in the ways that many have been saying. MTGO is not "dying". Cardhoarder has said that until the past week or two there had been no uptick in folks selling off their collections. Standard participation in the MTGO leagues has been higher than ever before, and I can tell from the value of my Modern cards that Modern is seeing an uptick in play now, as it always does after its autumnal low.

There has been one area, and one area alone, where Arena has caused a decline on MTGO, and that's regarding Limited. I've seen it in my own engagement with the two platforms, I've seen it in the league participation numbers, in the wait times for flashback and cube queues, and on Twitter from many others. The ability to experience Limited for free on Arena, even in low quantities and with a compromised bot-based drafting experience, has really cut into drafting on MTGO across the board.

The reason is simple. Drafting on MTGO is a relatively high stakes affair, one that you have to put a lot of money into and perform extremely well in order to avoid losing money. Winning 50-percent of your matches in draft will, on average, mean that you're losing $3. There's a lot of stress involved in knowing that you could be down $45 in an hour if you lose a few matches in a row. Drafting on Arena, by contrast, is relatively carefree. Arena drafting is to MTGO drafting what vaping is to smoking -- it let's you get your drafting fix in without putting your wallet at risk.

As a result, drafting participation across MTGO has declined even as Constructed participation has grown. Guilds of Ravnica competitive draft participation was roughly equivalent to that of Hour of Devastation (consistently sustaining about 600-650 participants). Ixalan consistently sustained about 700-750 participants, Rivals of Ixalan 750-800, and Dominaria 850-900. That's a 29-percent decrease from Dominaria and a 14-percent decline from Ixalan.

What really clued me into the decline was that Innistrad flashback queues for Halloween were taking about 30 minutes to fire where before they had taken only about 10. I can just tell that people aren't willing to fork over an arm and a leg to draft on MTGO like they were in the past. You can tell that Wizards is aware of this fact because a few weeks ago they brought back a means to play the flashbacks for $6 instead of $10. I think they are going to have to make drafting cheaper overall to drive up participation (and profits), which would be a boon for consumers.

One eye-popping result of the decline in draft participation is that Guilds of Ravnica prices are very very high. You can buy a redeemable set of Guilds of Ravnica for $85, which is higher than for any set in recent memory.

II. Why is the December 6th Announcement so Important?

Investment on MTGO requires that Constructed be played, as Constructed demand determines individual card prices. The reason that Standard card prices have done so well (and I mean really well! My investment returns on Core 19 and Dominaria cards has been almost 100%, and my Ixalan Block investments have improved toward close to 60%) is that most players can play Standard on MTGO more cheaply than they can on Arena. Magic Online offers real prizes so there's a real metagame. Because of the existence of a real metagame, players who enjoy the thrill of competition want to be able to adapt to the metagame and change decks, which is something that will cost you an arm and a leg on Arena.

If on December 6th a serious reason to play Magic competitively on Arena comes into existence-- for example, if you can actually make money by performing well, if your performance can gain you entry into major stake Magic tournaments -- it is likely that Magic Online will take a serious hit. That's not set in stone -- there's still a serious money problem on Arena, and the monetary barrier to acquire a collection to enable you to realistically compete in top-flight tournaments will be enormous --, but it would at minimum signal an intention from Wizards that it wants competitive Standard Magic to be done on Arena. That would be enough to make me squeamish to continue to invest in Magic Online.

If the announcement is something else -- if the announcement involves a revamped ranking system, or Standard streamer showdowns, or an invite-only tournament series done on the platform and streamed on Twitch -- then that will give me confidence to continue investing in Magic Online, and specifically in Guilds of Ravnica.

What matters to me as an investor is whether playing Standard at a reasonably competitive level continues to be best done for most people on Magic Online. What I’m trying to discern from the announcement is the long term vision for the Arena platform — is it going to remain singularly committed to providing a Hearthstone experience best of ones and all, or is it going to lay the groundwork for traditional competitive Magic to be played on the platform?

III. Signing Off

Another major issue — perhaps a more major issue — is the continued pummeling being done to card values due to Treasure Chests. In my next article I’m going to delve into some key ways that the MTGO economy could be “saved” and made more healthy.

If you have any questions, please let me know, either in the comments or on Discord. My hope is that the Arena announcement won't be anything too serious and that I'll be able to do a financial power ranking article for Guilds of Ravnica in good conscience this month. But definitely stay tuned to the December 6th announcement, as it could be very important and signal Wizards' visions for both MTGO and Arena for the coming months and years.

MTG Metagame Finance #22

Posted on December 6, 2018 by Edward Eng

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Let’s start off with a quick update. As you’ve probably noticed already, the article series title has changed from Hold ‘Em & Fold ‘Em to MTG Metagame Finance. I feel this is a more accurate description of what this article series is really about.

There are many amazing people out there who write about MTG finance. The content revolves around a lot of different aspects of the market. For example, some people focus on pure speculation based on the latest news, or data-driven assumptions. Others like Sigmund Ausfresser like to focus on older formats. And there are people who are experts on things like EDH/Commander.

However, as many of you might know by now, I’m really a tournament guy. I like to look at daily results from Magic Online. I check Star City Games, Channel Fireball, and TCGplayer several times a day. I’m constantly on sites like MTG Stocks and MTG Top 8 to look at tournament results. I’m also in some chat groups with quite a few Magic grinders. And I used to play quite a few tourneys before I had a baby.

So all in all, that’s truly where my Magic heart is. Thus, I think the article series name change makes more sense. But feel free to hit me up on social media or the comments below if you have suggestions that might help people find this article series even faster via a web search.

Article Series Main Focus Points

Cards that you should hold on to or pick up for tournaments if you need them before they rise in price. These cards are either seeing increased play in one or more formats, the supply is drying up, or they’re pretty far from the next reprint.
Cards that you should consider selling or trading away. Their prices are pretty much at the ceiling owing to inflation from speculation, reprint inevitability in the near future, a lull in tournament play, or some combination of these.

Folds

Drogskol Captain - Dark Ascension (Non-Foil)

There was an error retrieving a chart for Drogskol Captain

Target Sell Prices
Non-Foil: $2+
Foil: $25+

Bant Spirits is one of the best decks in Modern right now. It was the most represented deck in day two at SCG Baltimore, although it didn’t make the top eight this time.

Does that mean the deck is on a downturn? I don’t think so. I doubt it will be down for long, since it plays two of the most impactful one-mana spells in Modern: Aether Vial and Noble Hierarch. For more on the archetype, read Dylan Hand’s article on Star City Games.

So why am I mentioning Drogskol Captain as a Fold? Well, this is the only printing of the card, and Wizards seems to love printing new tribal product. So I could easily see this getting reprinted.

However, foils are a bit trickier. Since this is the foil version of the original printing, it’ll hold a premium. Plus, it probably won’t see a foil reprint in a tribal product if Wizards comes out with one. So I could also see holding onto the foil copies if you want.

Holds

Knight of Autumn - Guilds of Ravnica (Non-Foil & Foil)

There was an error retrieving a chart for Knight of Autumn

Target Purchase Price
Non-Foil: $2.50ish
Foil: $10

This card is so versatile, and it’s finally starting to drop in price as more Guilds of Ravnica is opened. This is going to be a tournament staple for a long time. It hasn’t even been out for half a year, and look how many non-Standard decks play this card already.

One thing I would be careful of is that I could see Wizards making this a promo down the road. So keep an eye out for that. But for now, this is a solid card to pick up and add to your collection.

Extirpate - Planar Chaos & Modern Masters (Non-Foil & Foil)

There was an error retrieving a chart for Extirpate

Target Purchase Price
Non-Foil: $5ish
Foil: $7-10

If you haven’t seen the latest Modern Mill deck, take a look at Jason Chung’s (aka sqlut) latest list.

This doesn’t see a whole lot of play yet, but the foils are fairly affordable and could spike if this type of deck catches on. Time will tell since Mission Briefing is only a few months old (and a card I mentioned in article #19).

Pithing Needle - Masterpiece Series: Kaladesh Inventions

There was an error retrieving a chart for Pithing Needle

Target Purchase Price
Under $80

One of the readers that reached out to me regarding the free giveaway feature in article #21 suggested fetchlands like Arid Mesa and Misty Rainforest, as well as Scars of Mirrodin fastlands like Seachrome Coast. At the same time, he asked me what I thought about different versions of Engineered Explosives.

I responded by saying that I’ve had my eye on a few Inventions, namely Defense Grid, Trinisphere, Scroll Rack, and Crucible of Worlds. I’ve also had my eye on Engineered Explosives for a while now too. But as I highlighted in article #18, I hope you got rid of the non-Invention versions before Ultimate Masters was spoiled.

And then a few days later, I came across Pithing Needle and realized I had forgotten to point it out as a target. So I reached out again and told him about this one, as it sees play in quite a few decks.

Hazoret the Fervent - Masterpiece Series: Amonkhet Invocations

There was an error retrieving a chart for Hazoret the Fervent

Target Purchase Price
Under $60

This has been dropping in price since it rotated out of Standard. Yet, it still sees play in a decent number of Modern decks, as well as Legacy’s Dragon Stompy.

Most notably, it’s starting to appear alongside Arclight Phoenix, which is popping up everywhere now. Take a look at Jeffrey Carr’s second place list from SCG Baltimore.