The 30th Anniversary Edition of Magic: The Gathering has been making headlines since it was announced in October.Magic’s first set (partially from Wizards of the Coast) promised never to reprint back in 1996) many player with arms crossedto the point Wall Street pays attentionThe tension around it is higher than I’ve seen in any Magic product in a very long time, some claiming it’s too high an insult to the player base, while others claim it’s a premium collection of games built upon them. Some people see it as just one of
So when Wizards of the Coast offered to send IGN 2 for coverage we deemed appropriate, I was honestly pretty surprised. On November 28th, officially available Less than 1 hour before the official Magic Twitter account announcement The sale is “completed”.WOTC, on the other hand, seems already sent pucks to celebrities such as baseball player Hunter Pence,Furthermore 4 amazing packs Its inclusion in the swag bag of the most expensive Black Lotus VIP tier at the Magic 30 convention in Las Vegas further reinforced the community’s perception that the product was reserved for high net worth individuals.
Frankly, I never expected to see one, let alone two, of these boxes in person. With FOMO (fear of missing out) fueling the hype for this premium product, I can’t help but feel it’s intentional. you cannot open itself. It’s not fair for me to speculate if that’s actually intended, but the result is the same. .
The WOTC’s decades-long promise not to reprint the Reserved List, or certain classic cards, has been evident for some time, even from former WOTC employee Bill Stark. recent tweets It cannot be abolished for legal reasons that “it will bankrupt the game”. Since the 30th Anniversary Edition recreates (mostly) Magic’s first set, it includes a number of preorder reprints.These cards have different backs and none are tournament legal, but this is a pretty drastic change in policy – Magic’s Head Designer Mark Rosewater said The reserved list covered “all regular-sized versions” of these cards as of last August.
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The promise of opening a stand-in of rare and highly sought-after cards is a tempting pitch for some and a waste of money for others, but I don’t see how these packs will actually work as a player. I was really curious how it would open up. Put aside for a moment and unpack Magic’s first set and take a trip down memory lane. Shiny new borders and non-tournament legal backs are a nostalgic treat…or sorting out a 30-year-old draft to hit a very limited list of possible diamonds in the rough Hopeful and disappointed in its own merits?
Opening up these $1000 light sticks for discussion was a somewhat odd and ultimately pretty adversarial experience, so the answer for me was somewhere in the middle. It was fun to see cards I knew from childhood in pristine condition and in modern frames, but that didn’t mean it was particularly exciting. Cracking an old-school counterspell or dark ritual elicited almost the same reaction as opening the Starburst Wrapper to find the pink wrapper waiting at the head of the line.
The mixed feelings of happiness and loneliness became even more chaotic, actually opened one of power nine – The names of nine of Magic’s oldest, most powerful, and most expensive cards. Black Lotus among them.mine is mox jetsoon followed by one retro-frame version of the coveted dual land ( taiga, in this case) into the same pack. If opening boosters were a game, I’d just won, but neither card was bleeding the way I was expecting. In contrast, I unwrapped the more refreshing Rare in his $4 booster pack in a recent set. Instead, my first thought upon seeing my new Mox was, “Where are you going to store this?”
Power Nine is banned in Magic’s most popular format, Commander, so it’s not really a card I can play. It’s never been sold, so it’s not a valuable card to me. No… definitely a cool piece of paper to have, but now that I have it, I don’t know what to do with it. It’s hard not to feel like you’re gambling for the chance to open something that sells for more. big It’s part of the sales pitch here, without which these packs wouldn’t be very attractive at such a high price.
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Looking directly at the cards, the cost of the 30th Anniversary Edition is that these packs are can It’s been a really fun way for more people to experience Magic’s roots first hand. We look forward to celebrating the game’s birthday by doing an affordable Beta Draft at your local game store. . Exclusively gating an otherwise pretty neat product as a collector’s item is a valid decision WOTC would make if they wanted to do it, but it’s just a bummer for the rest of us .
But either way, I’d say much of the community’s frustration isn’t so much from the location or the quality of the product itself as they desperately want to open these packs, but from what many people have been asking for for years. I think it comes from feeling. Currently, the reserved list mainly benefits people who make money off the scarcity it causes, but many who try to play games with those cards harm the player.do At the end Get massive new editions of things like the long-awaited dual lands – reprints you’ll be happy to play in Commander, and whose legal status outside of tournaments often doesn’t matter to playgroups – out of reach Just for the price.Disappointing.
One counter-argument to that is that the illegitimate status clearly cements this as being for collectors only, discouraging the average person from buying expensive packs just to get them. It’s not forcing, so most players can safely ignore it.. Looking at the whole situation, I think that’s a fair view, but the door to the reservation list is something that many people have never thought possible. It’s now open in the way I thought it would be. Anyway, regardless of whether or not you ignore this particular product, it will actually pass.
After opening the 30th Anniversary Edition for yourself, you don’t necessarily think it’s a complete, game-destroying disaster or anything like that. (To be clear, unless you’re literally Post Malone, I wouldn’t recommend it either. As such, I can’t help but feel like a relatively dry Magic product in my hands, and as a result, I’ve done more when I opened Standard Rare this year than when I opened Mox Jet. I am left with a rather bizarre experience that had some exciting moments.
Tom Marks Deputy Review Editor at IGN. He loves puzzles, platformers, puzzle platformers and more.
