For those unaware, Magic: the Gathering recently banned several expensive cards ($100 and $2-300) from the game’s most popular way to play (Commander a.k.a. Elder Dragon Highlander). This is after one of those cards was put in a recent set that was a selling point for lots of people. Wizards of the Coast knew about this ban from an independent group of organizers almost a year ago, but went ahead with the printings anyway.
So now some people have cards they bought for over $100 plummet to prices below $50 (and continuing to drop) since this one type of play is the only place these cards were used. Foil versions were once going as high as $800 to $1,000 but are now dropping to $200.
The thing is, these cards were never on Magic’s “reserve list,” cards Wizards has promised to never print tournament-legal versions of. The last cards added to the list were in 1999/2000. Cards after that can be printed into the ground. Anyone who pays attention to Magic prices knows cards not on that list can have their prices gutted overnight. You shouldn’t be investing in collectables, anyway. But especially Magic cards and especially not ones that can be reprinted.
We now have this situation where capitalists do what they do and a bunch of people, including Tim Pool, are flipping the fuck out after getting scammed by Wizards of the Coast and their owner, Hasbro. Older players warn people about this all the time that WotC will print cards they know they’re going to ban, then wait until those cards have been sold off before pulling the trigger. They win either way. Whales who must always buy new thing before getting hyped to buy the next new thing fork over their money trying to get ahead of everyone else. Players wanting a balanced and fair game are happy because the problem cards are gone (and thus not quitting).
“”“”“Investors”“”“” have been a blight on TCGs from the get-go. A lot of Magic’s recent problems have been from the feedback loop created by Commander/EDH (a whole other can of worms I’m not getting into in this post). So it’s doubly hilarious when the overlap of EDH players who treat their decks like an investment get burnt. Especially since their format isn’t a tournament-oriented one so you can just use proxy/fake versions of cards and anyone who cares is someone you can ignore.
Vintage and Cube players continue to win bigly since we own these cards because we actually play with them, so their value is irrelevant.
I hate the business model of these card games. The gameplay is usually pretty good and the competitive aspect is nice. But the competitive chase cards being at predatory distributions in the product really turned me off to the whole thing.
It affects the game balance too I bet. For example ban worthy cards not getting banned to not torpedo these fools whose life savings are in mtg cards.
It does from time to time. You’ll see “pushed” (ie really good and hard to get) cards come out and enjoy their time and then either they get banned or the synergistic cards that make them format warping get banned.
I don’t even mind that aspect of the product cycle that much. I enjoy they competitive aspect and some strategies can and will be better than others.
But the cards that define the format being inaccessible AND this type of product design that’s endemic to the CCG business model really sucks. And IRL play is so much better than sims, especially if you’re trying to improve at the game too.