No, not yet. But my experiences with their premium tarot, standard european, and mini American sleeves have been good so far.

I don't fully know the answer to that, but I do know that sealed Magic product, especially for limited print run items like commander decks, can command decent prices in time because of their collectability (for example--for people trying to get sealed copies of all commander decks). That would be my guess. It is surprising it's so high for what was a pretty cheap deck for a while after it was released.

You're correct. Looks like I completely forgot to check to see if I had anything good in red. 😅

There's no absolute winner in regards to the tightest fit and it depends on which American standard you're talking about. For the 56x87 American standard cards: Mayday Standard's soft sleeves are tightest around the sides of the card and Mayday Premium's sleeves will give you the closest fit from the opening of the sleeve to the top edge of your card. For 58x89 American standard cards: All of the ones I've tested are about the same around the sides of the card. Arcane Tinmen's non-glare sleeves and Ultimate Guard's premium soft sleeves will give you the shortest distance from the opening of the sleeve to the top edge of the card.

Thanks! I'm still using an older 1080p camera and don't have the funds to get a nice new 4K camera yet, but I do hope to improve my gear someday so the video quality is better.

I haven't sleeved many new games with mini-American cards since I made this video, so I don't have a good basis for updating my recommendations.

I don't have any experience between the X-Wing sleeves so I can't comment on their quality, but since X-Wing is a discontinued game, there's a good chance that the availability of those sleeves will dry up at some point and if you want your mini American sleeves to match each other in the future, starting with the regular mini American soft sleeves is probably better.

@@refreshdaemon Thanks for answering. After playing with the cards, they are too small for my taste, also I'm used to standard sized card like Magic. I will open PS and resize all card to standard card size and print them. Anyway thanks for answering

It's fine for its purpose as a starter deck to learn the game with, but unless you're just planning on playing very casually in play mode and don't mind getting stomped on frequently, I think upgrading the deck is a good idea. What kind of format are you interested in playing? With a deck this old, you'll probably need to play in Explorer or Historic for your cards to be legal. You might start by just trying the deck out in play mode to see how it plays and then upgrade it to meet the challenges you face among your opponents.

It's probably between this sleeve and the following. I have links to my reviews so you can find the part where I put them in the sleeves to see if you like how they fit. Arcane Tinman: kzbin.info/www/bejne/iImwl2mHnd18epo Arcane Tinman Non-Glare: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jpaamJmgrdB3sLM Mayday Standard: kzbin.info/www/bejne/moanfKSfp7Sal7s

@@refreshdaemon Looks like it might be the mayday ones. Are you gonna review other tarot sized sleeve brands?

@@slywizardreborn8121 I haven't covered them all, but you can find links to the many that I have reviewed in the description box and pinned comments of this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/a4vKnXVof75rsLM

I don't have it recorded, but I have fit double-sleeved cards in here. It's a tighter fit and I don't feel like sleeve covers will fit, but I can't say for certain. I don't have any sleeve covers to test with.

Thank you!

Thanks! It's slow going sometimes, all the shooting and editing, but I enjoy sharing the Magic (and other games) I've been exploring and I'm glad you found the video(s) helpful too!

It's certainly one of the more fun precons I've had a chance to play with, but I do think upgrades are necessary to help it play better as you suggest. I personally have an affinity for blink shenanigans, so that's probably the direction I'd push it if I'm going to spend more time with Ranar. I think Ranar would also play well with plot cards too--it's just too bad that he doesn't discount them as well.

@@refreshdaemon Put some Foretell Cards like Doomskar in it an like, play some foretell Cards and after the first Boardwipe or alike; others will be careful as soon as you have a covered Card in Exile. Plus, you can generate token relativly quickly. Or you spam creatures if you have Day of the Dragon. And if you wanna get really spicy, use Farewell + Blinking. Farewell is the most expensive Card, but if you add Cosmo/Cosmic Charger (how its called?) e.g. plus Doomskar + change e.g. the tapped Mana Land Cards for Cards which come untapped into the game and generate mana + have some other Effects like Mystic Maze, which are all fairly cheap, you have with the Cards in the Deck a fairly strong White/Blue Deck. You can blink your stuff out, you have a couple of Buffs for your Commander and while I did exchange some Creatures just for the Vibe of it; add e.g. Cosima. Already a token more on your Commander. So there are alot of very strong combination in it, which are not "Winning in two turns" like, but most Precons don't have that and are fairly easily countered. I didn't play against the Elve Deck from Kaldheim - because nobody wanted to pay 80 Bucks for it. But even against an Eldrazi Deck with a couple of expensive Eldrazi Cards in it, its a 50/50 Ratio. And if you blink Ranar, he still gets a Token if I am not mistaken by the way. So you have even a fairly strong Board Wipe in it already. I would not know a Precon under 50 Bucks which is better than the Phantom Deck tbh. Actually, you have to invest around 50 Bucks to get a Commander Deck in general, which is compareable and then you don't have a new mechanic like Foretell which can be pretty rat and throws off a couple of people. Just Foretell cards, get Tokens, blink and board wipe and suddenly you kick out the last two players with flying tokens.

You can see it play against its sister sealed deck here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/kHubo6WjjKmcl8k

Glad to hear they've improved their quality control!

Yeah, I had no idea if I could win after my opponent had me at such a huge life disadvantage!

Thanks so much! I hope it was helpful.

I know Dragon Shield makes them for standard playing card sizes (www.dragonshield.com/en-us/sleeve-crafter), but I haven't heard of anyone doing it for tarot sized cards.

That's too bad! Hopefully future codes won't suffer the same fate.

I'm editing it now and hope to have it released today if I have enough time. If not, it will be uploaded tomorrow.

You're welcome! Glad it was helpful!

😁

I have not personally seen sleeves for those two sizes, but I know that Swan Panasia makes sleeves for many uncommon card sizes, so you might want to look into their products.

@@refreshdaemon thanks for the recomendation, indeed swan panasia had a lot choice. the board game I own, I hardly find sleeve due to uncommon size, I manage to find the sleeve for the card from Swan, unfortunately the 2 size I mention above is for the game notes, Swan don't had that size too 😞

You're welcome! I love to watch games using these weird precons and formats so it's my pleasure to mash them together and share the results too.

Thank you, @MrOpiumField. I'd like to compliment you on your excellent choice of profile picture as well.

My win rate is high enough that I've only had to spend a small amount of money ($15) twice in the last 5 years. Technically, I didn't have to, since I could grind for gold, but I wanted in on the new card sets right away. I think that's not too bad for free to play, although you do have to win frequently to carry over like that and it doesn't apply to constructed play, which I don't really do.

I was tempted to go red-black for sure with Akul and At Knifepoint in my pool. I didn't have Rakdos himself, but I did have Rakdos joins up as a way to reanimate Akul. Unfortunately, Akul's power level in limited plus his rigid mana cost wasn't amazing and I didn't have enough outlaws in RB for At Knifepoint to feel like it was rewarding much. I would have had to go fully 3 color with blue or white mixed in to build a curve and I felt it would be too clunky and prone to mana issues. I'll be dropping a blog post on Init_Games soon with the full sealed pool (link will be in the description) and maybe we can all see if hindsight is much clearer. Did you attend prerelease too? If so, what did you end up running?

My pleasure! Did you attend prerelease and what did you ending up playing, if so?

I don't have any extras right now, but someday in the future, I might pick up another prerelease pack and when I do, I'll share it in a future video for the first person to see it to redeem it.

🐿

I would recommend the larger size as I think the Wingspan cards lean just a little wider so they might be too tight of a fit. If you want to get Mayday Sleeves, those larger sleeves are called "USA Chimera".

You're welcome! I'm glad it was helpful.

Thanks! That Rip to Pieces card is so devastating! I'm surprised I didn't lose the second one.

Thank you thank you!

The final planeswalker decks were some of the strongest of the bunch, but the Horde is probably the weakest of the challenge decks.

The challenge decks are a fun way to try out my limited and precon decks. I use them with every set's releases that I have.

Sorry that your experience with these were so bad! I bought a few more and also found that there was definitely some unevenness in terms of height and width between packs too. Fortunately, I haven't experienced any sleeves that were entirely too tight for the cards they were intended to sleeve yet, which did end up bending my cards with Mayday and BCW at this size, so my experience hasn't been as bad, but I certainly wouldn't recommend this anymore to anyone looking for consistency between packs.

@@refreshdaemon thank you refresh, you're reviews and comparisons have helped me and many others for years on which sleeves to purchase ... 2 things i've learned throughout the years is that bargain sleeves many times end up not being a bargain and avoid mayday sleeves if you can lol

@@dirtmike6258 you’re welcome! I figured since I was doing the comparisons for myself I should share with others and maybe get more data points so we can collectively get the best sleeves for our games and collectibles.

Some of these older decks probably cost more than they are fun by now. If you're new and just playing for fun, I'd look at the newer starter kits or the five decks in the Game Night set as the price is more commensurate with the fun of the deck. If they're still affordable, the challenge decks from 2019-2022 are even more focused and could be even more fun being played against each other casually. Alternatively, if you're playing multiplayer free-for-all, I'd suggest looking into available commander decks and learning that format, because that's probably the most popular multiplayer format.

Thanks!

Maybe I've just not had the right opportunity for it to shine, but it's always just been a 3/1 flash trade for me earlier on in the format. I never got the value from its bounce effect in LCI, so I got cold on it and stopped picking it high. But if you think it's stellar, I'll give it another shot if I get to draft it again.

@@refreshdaemonyeah id give it a shot and try to be more creative with it, like for example it already had a great synergy with the first card you picked, sanguine evangelist, by giving you an extra 1/1 flyer. You can also use it with sawblades, oltec cloud guard, ironpaw aspirant, and lots of other cards just in white to get lots of extra value, not to mention when you start to dip into other colors. Put this thing with a tithing blade and you have double removal.

@@calebmills6051 Thanks for the rec. I'll keep that in mind when I see it in the future!

Yeah, it's no fun to watch nothing happening.

I do want to try the blue red deck! Captain Storm has been a beast on the other side of the battlefield.

You're welcome and I hope you can find a way to access your cards again.

Apologies. Apparently my compressor wasn't working and I couldn't find a way to clean up the sound in post.