The End Of Draft And Set Booster Packs | Magic: The Gathering To Introduce Play Boosters

[@TolarianCommunityCollege]

Time To Get Better At Mulligans! Check out our new guide here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rKqxdqCvbLqSjtk Watch me play with Secret Lair Heads I Win, Tales You Lose on Shuffle Up here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/iX6qkoR7oJV8nc0

[@TheMeditatingRaven]

Somehow, I think this change is going to make constructed format like Pioneer, Pauper, and the various EDH formats more attractive since Limited packs are getting more expensive for cards that may not retain playability outside of Limited. I think WOTC does not grasp that Magic is at its most fun when it is financially accessible, and stuff like this seems to enhance the financial gatekeeping that is plaguing much of MTG right now.

[@lawrenceblade4437]

Btw! Happy Anniversary for the 10 years that you have been with us Professor!

[@blindcommander]

Not sure if like this this for Set Boosters. Won't forcing draft quality weaken set boosters? I didn't even know ppl still did draft?

[@jimmycastillonjr.8169]

I feel it would be great for draft but for sealed it wouldn’t be so great because the fact that someone can get that 4 rare pack and dominate the playing field in that event that’s my only concern

[@brianm2242]

My only interaction with organized play was through limited...and I haven't played in a limited format in close to two years. This will bring me back if I can find a decent LGS.

[@nosrin1988]

They need to get rid of the ad card. They put ads on the back of tokens, there's ZERO reason to have double sided ad cards wasting cardboard.

[@SpawnofJack]

Absolutely this.

[@RealSonScotty]

Facts!!!

[@5000KAITOSHION]

Yes. It annoys me so much when I don’t get tokens and only ads

[@greyderpanite3344]

Beat idea yet

[@Kingofnoodles]

Especially considering it's an ad for the product you've already bought! I get why they're doing it, but it's just silly.

[@princephantom1294]

“Took 3 years, but the effect finally resolved.” Sounds like a commander game of 8 people all playing mono blue

[@sentientwaffle535]

Or Izzet

[@ruttokyrpa3472]

Really cool that drafting becomes more expensive to save drafting

[@amason8479]

team wotc world drafters

[@lightworker2956]

Beatings will continue until morale improves.

[@sunstrid3r44]

To save drafting from... wotc itself!

[@BusinessSkrub]

And yet y'all will keep paying

[@Damage146]

​@@BusinessSkrubnope, i play with the cards i have and havent bought any magic product for like 2 years now. i dont like where this is going and its just to many products stuffed in a year. i find it so frustrating that as soon as one set dropps, the next set is allready been presented. everything feels so damn rushed. play commander, buy singels or trade stuff you need with stuff you have.

[@scampb]

From a previous store owner: These new packs are going to be a huge problem for Limited events at stores. 1) Cost is too high; drafts/sealed were aready creeping up in price to where many could not afford it. Now it will be totally out of reach for some and cause others to not play Limited as often. 2) Too many rares; in sealed events in particular you are going have some people open a pool of rares that will increase their odds of winning by quite a bit. Does that make for a fun experience for all the opponents they will face 3) Too many rares again, in draft what will happen when someone opens a booster with so much value they don't want to pass and draft the pack. In the store I used to own we had a rule where if you opened two cards with real dollar value $15 or higher you could purchase a new pack to replace that one so you were not passing too much value. This was only incorporated because some people would just leave the draft table and the entire draft experience was ruined if we did not. This happened with such infrequency that it was not really an issue. But now, you are going to see this more often. If I am drafting do I really want to pass value that is going to help me pay for the cost of the draft? Probably not. But am I also going to want to pay the increased price of replacing that one pack, if your LGS allows for such a thing. I really think what Wizards should have done was to have a normal draft set and then collector boosters for those that want the chance of fancy cards. But THAT would not have been good for Wizards profits so yes, Limited formats will still suffer, in my opinion.

[@chartypeplays2396]

The only point I think isn't going to be a problem for most people is point 3. That sounds like an odd system where people can just not pass the pack. In the draft events I've played in, you play a flat fee for the draft, you have to pass the packs after you pick from them, and you get to keep what you draft plus what you win. If letting people play to keep the packs works for you then okay, but I've never heard of anyone else doing it that way. I agree with everything else you said though.

[@Aveeguides]

@@chartypeplays2396you missed the whole part where he said people would just leave the draft altogether if they opened a “god pack.” You can tell people, “You have to stay and commit,” but at the end of the day, if someone opens 2 $20 cards, and they don’t want to pass a $20 card-they *will* get up and leave. In an even worse scenario, people may be encouraged to bring bulk rares to stuff packs with before passing them on as a way to ensure they keep valuable cards from their packs. The world isn’t perfect, and people don’t always play by the rules.

[@ukaszkiljan6316]

My only problem is the price increase for the drafts and prerelease

[@accountid9681]

I would be upset at this, but if I recall correctly, people who only draft generally sell their pulls to cover costs, so the increased rare rate will make breaking even just as likely

[@RBGolbat]

Unless the price of rares goes down because more are opened. There’s no way to tell what will actually happen and the outcomes because of this change until it actually starts happening.

[@ThisNameIsBanned]

Which is also a major scam. Its 15 cards, just the same as a draft pack, it SHOULD cost the same as a draft pack, as its the exact same product. The fact its more rares (its more like 1.4 rares) SHOULD not matter for the product cost, as the fact these will always have more rares will just decrease the value of every rare, as you get more naturally. 20$ drafts are already too expensive, its a SCAM and that should be what people call it, as this is a problem that WotC introduced, they try to sell a fix for the problem they made themselves and hide the simple fact that they make it all more expensive.

[@mikephillips1043]

​@@ThisNameIsBanned$20 a draft is not too much are you high? Thats less than $7 a pack. That's a fucking steal.

[@krisdaschwab912]

​@@mikephillips1043That comes out to $6.66 per pack. Hail Satan!

[@Psychosaur]

I think a real problem hinted to in this video are players driven away by the higher costs. Draft was one of the cheaper entry points to playing magic. With price increases that could drive away people from playing the game. Sure a portion of the market has shown that people are willing to spend more for a fancier product, but what about the sales lost from people who have been priced out. I was excited to buy the Sliver precon this summer untill I saw the price. It feels like this is happening more and more.

[@heyitsdross]

Same, I was loving the idea of buying the Eldrazi precon until I saw the decklist and the 106€ price tag at my LGS, and was just like lol nvm then. Even the latest set of precons costing 60€ is too much for me, I'd rather start making pauper Commander decks for basically the same price and have the fun of putting the thing together myself.

[@lexyeevee]

i got briefly back into the game right around the hasbro acquisition, via draft, and i already felt ridiculous paying so much for a booster box. regular playing cards are, what, 3¢ per card? magic already wants me to pay ten times that, for the mere privilege of /gambling/. and now they want to jack it up more? come on. there are other ways to spend my free time.

[@bryanbaggett5421]

Drafting at my LGS a few years ago was $12, then it crept up to $15, then with the price increase in Dominaria United it went up to $17. With this change, i'm guessing it will be around $20. That is a significant amount if you are normally drafting 4 times a month. Might not seem like a ton, but when you combine it with all of the inflation elsewhere in this economy, it causes problems.

[@petulantpeterturbo]

I don't really see this as a problem at all, according to the statistics the majority was vast enough for draft booster boxes to be axed entirely, that would not have happened if people were actually using that as their entry point.

[@pedrino321]

My problem isn’t the cost, it’s the value. I get way more value from set boosters than from draft. Hell i still don’t know why set boosters aren’t allowed for drafts.

[@SurlyDuff814]

I'm not going to stubbornly proclaim that this is a wholly negative change (it's not) but how convenient for WotC that the solution is going to be more expensive for players. Neat huh?

[@ipsyop]

They'd be stupid not to do what they are doing, especially if the trend was that people were already buying the more expensive product.

[@Zomburai45]

It's just amazing how every "smart" and "necessary" decision keeps fucking over the consumer, huh?@@ipsyop

[@2013Arcturus]

I'll do ya the favor and say it's 100% negative. I already don't but cards much anymore cause everything in the world is too expensive, this just grantee I'll save my money and by investment/EDH cards off eBay.

[@erlockruuziik7237]

This is positive in the same way that it's positive to be the nicest guy in prison

[@shaeferweleschuk1324]

I’m not going to fully decide until I get the chance to play limited with play boosters. Prereleases tend to feel fun, but then when you actually break down the kinds of cards you got from the event it was usually a bit underwhelming.

[@chrispitts1693]

My biggest issue is that the introduction of set boosters seemed to make the phasing out of traditional draft boosters inevitable. It's hard to not feel like this is simply how they chose to raise the cost of draft boosters with the smallest amount of pushback. They tested the market with a more expensive booster with the intent to shift everything to that model if/when it sold.

[@Bluecho4]

While I'm all for assuming the scummiest behavior from a corporation, I'm skeptical anyone at WotC thought that far ahead about Set Boosters. More likely, they just wanted a new, pricier product to sell, and had it include more perks to make it desirable. The result of making Draft Boosters so _undesirable_ was an unintended consequence. A problem WotC proceeded to ignore for years, until they realized how badly Draft Boosters were selling. I suspect the execs floated the idea of removing Draft Boosters and going on their way, until someone explained to them that Drafting is an important part of the business model. So Play Boosters were created to consolidate the two products (and thus customers) into one. That they could use this as an opportunity to quietly upcharge the cost for Drafting is definitely what tipped the scale on that decision, of course. tldr: The suits at WotC are greedy scum, but they're also incompetent and short-sighted. So it probably wasn't a scheme years in the making. It was them selling you the solution to a problem they created by mistake.

[@Sutefusama]

@@Bluecho4 sorry didn't read all of this just because if you read Mark Rosewater's post it's definitely written black on white that in the studio they actually EXPECTED draft boosters to disappear the moment set boosters were created. It was only a question of time, they knew that would happen.

[@gaebril131]

​@Sutefusama which post would that be

[@tj2themax]

@@Bluecho4This right here. I can 100% agree that this is exactly what lead to this but it all honesty, I would've been more fine with Set Boosters disappearing than Draft. I dont expect there to be any more value to be had in these Play Boosters than the regular draft boosters we had prior to all of this.

[@Sutefusama]

@@gaebril131 problem #3 on Mark Rosewater post about play boosters. I may have extrapolated a bit on this one but here how it was written : "We do a lot of future forecasting in Studio X, and our people were saying that given enough time, they believed Draft Boosters would stop being a thing"

[@dokanzan5623]

I'm from Brazil, and here we are feeling completely overwhelmed by this change. Magic, in general, is going to become SO EXPENSIVE. You guys have no idea.

[@Snst-404]

Currently I can barely afford Magic drafts and with this new change I might be no longer able to draft, while set boosters were more of a treat (a one off, if you had the money to spare) having it as the base for drafts where one buys multiple packs at a time, really compounds the higher pricetag

[@dokanzan5623]

@@Snst-404 dark times are coming, sad to see the game that i love going for this path, and there's nothing we can do about it

[@fedemotta3]

Oh we at south america are fucked. No way I'm drafting at set booster prices.

[@Horderek]

I like to do this analysis for brasil: A Wilds of Eldraine draft booster is 33brl, Minimum wage is 1035brl/month. That makes the draft boost cost 3.2% of wage. At TCG Player website, wilds of Eldraine draft booster is 3.4 usd. Minimum wage in new York is 14.20/hour, that gives 2640/month. That makes the draft booster cost 0.14% of wage. Brasil is about 23x more expensive than abroad

[@sunstrid3r44]

​@@Horderekthis is the set booster price, woe draft boosters are around 25brl, but your point stands. Limited is expensive as hell here

[@RaunienTheFirst]

What concerns me the most (apart from the price increase) is the effect that the change in the proportions of rarities will have on Sealed. It's less if a problem in draft, as everyone sees most of every pack and you still only get to pick one card at a time, but in sealed, this will hugely increase the variability. If your 6 packs all have one rare or maybe one pack has 2, and someone else got a 4 rare pack, they're in a much stronger position right off the bat.

[@billdoetsch]

Yeah, this increases the variance in competitive sealed events a decent bit. Unfortunately that also benefits WOTCs bottom line. 'Maybe if you open one more Arena Open pool you'll get there with a good one!' - the more it becomes like a lottery, the better for WOTC.

[@bondeulv]

This was already the case with MOM. (Legends slot, Battle, slot Rare/Mythic slot, possible Foil)

[@billdoetsch]

@@bondeulvYou mean MOM, the bomby, swingy format?

[@mrcatchingup]

The reality is that a lot of "rares" are actually uncommons in every box. WotC tries to trick buyers info thinking they are getting bonus rares when in reality they try to mislead the buyers with a false gold expansion symbols. So people won't really be opening bomb threat level rares any more often.

[@bondeulv]

@@billdoetsch not as bad as Crimson Vow

[@thebattleofpelennorfieldsp6081]

Funny how game pieces can go from 15 to 14 and get more expensive at the same time.

[@notme222]

Simplifying the product line makes total sense. What we should dread is when they realize how much Arena has cannibalized paper drafting.

[@gabrielamaro1470]

This change plugs one hole, but the ship is still sinking under the weight of price increases and nonstop neverending set releases. I’m content to sit on the sideline and see how things shake out.

[@mofomiko]

Let's just stay ashore and see cheap singles getting washed on the beach

[@bdenneysr85]

Inflation is always and has always been a thing. To think that the price of magic the gathering wouldn’t increase along with the price of literally EVERYTHING ELSE is absurd. It is equally if not MORE absurd to say that “never ending” set releases are a thing that’s sinking the ship because the only reason MTG is still around and relevant is because WOTC keeps making more sets.

[@sharktrap267]

@@bdenneysr85inflation brought boxes from 90 to 115 in physical stores where I am. Almost 30% inflation within 2 years and a half. Salaries didn't really follow. But I do understand overpriced cardboard cannot stay overpriced if you don't gimp up your prices.

[@joeferreti9442]

@@bdenneysr85 That's actually nonsense. Inflation never increases all prices, only some categories. And there are also forces like better and optimized production that decrease prices. So, saying prices always have to go up is just a lie. And here we are talking about printed cardboard that costs single digit cents in mass production.

[@123pa1n]

@@bdenneysr85 well how convenient it is that at the same time, whenever they release a product that has more value on the secondary market which ofc doesnt exist, the prices go op drasticly despite the fact that its the same fcking cardboard and no foil cards have been printed with diamond dust and gold flavour text. Dont be a lemming ffs

[@Meep9092]

I agree with you Prof, I definitely am glad that we are going back to one type of non-premium pack. Most of my LGS said that the split gave them a huge headache and inventory nightmare. I'm hoping this helps.

[@utkphilobio]

WOTC: incentivizes players to largely ignore draft packs by making their EV bad and dropping support for organized play and is then Pikachu-shocked when people stop buying draft packs. Who could have seen this coming?

[@cherch222]

This was the plan all along. They wanted to charge more for limited but didn’t want to kill player good will by just flat out increasing price. They needed a “reason” which they manufactured.

[@billdoetsch]

I don't know that the EV was all that different, actually. The perceived EV, maybe, and players liked the gamble chance.

[@slx]

@@billdoetsch EV at this point doesn't mean value from the current set, it means value from reprinted cards based of the secondary market.

[@JivanPal]

> dropping support for organized play Eh? I am under no impression that WOTC is/was intentionally stifling draft events. It's one of their main sources of sustainable revenue.

[@cherch222]

@@JivanPal if that were true, then draft boosters would be outselling set boosters.

[@darangen]

I think, from hearing from many local game stores, that the "increased demand for Set Boosters" is often a result of Hasbro just not making draft boosters as available at the distribution level. I know many who wanted to order more Draft, but all that was available was Set Boosters, so their "data" is skewed because this was their plan all along to raise the price of the default booster.

[@EngineerLume]

Mark goes over this in the article, people preferred Set boosters over Draft Boosters on the whole, so they weren't buying Draft Boosters, so stores weren't ordering Draft Boosters, so Wizards made less Draft boosters, and this cycle kept going and going until the cost of making Draft boosters was becoming unsustainable

[@folkenphoenix]

Affirmative, they lie to the people in the face

[@darangen]

@@EngineerLume Yeah, that's what Mark said. I'm just going off what actual LGS's are saying as to why they ordered more Set Boosters. If they make 100 Set boxes available and only 5 Draft boxes, of course they're going to sell more Set boxes.

[@EngineerLume]

@@darangen And they made 5 because players weren't buying them

[@darangen]

@@EngineerLume But stores were trying to. How can players buy them if they weren't readily available? That's my point. Stores can't sell something they don't have, so they have to sell what they do have. When my friend who owns an LGS says he can't get them because the distributors don't have them, that's not a "players aren't buying them" issue, that's a "players CANT buy them" issue.

[@TheAvianoid]

This is going to make me attend less pre-release events. They are going to be even more expensive, and they were already absurdly expensive

[@NeoChromer]

Literally same as a commander deck

[@mofomiko]

Can't wait to pay a premium the next prerelease with my buddies and opening 15 bucks worth of cards, what a fun and enjoyable experience Wizards Boosters are

[@ccggenius]

I already stopped. I can buy all the singles I want from most sets for less than a single pre-release.

[@Kapao]

$30 to $36 for a prerelease is cheaper than a night out drinking

[@freethemonkey6768]

​@@Kapaodepends where you live

[@syn2pse638]

To me going to something like a draft night or prerelease for a new set is an excuse to spend a bit of money at my LGS, an increase of price in those sorts of events just means that I end up being more picky with what I buy afterwards. It's not entirely possible to say for certain at this point, but I believe this will lead me to spending less at my LGS due to an increase in event prices, even if its just $10. When LTR prerelease happened I ended up getting a lot less than I normally would due to its above average event price as it was harder to justify spending a lot on sealed things, especially when LTR was already expensive as a set; I don't think that the Play Booster price increase will be that egregious, but I do think that it will have a similar effect, ESPECIALLY for when sets that are high power and have multiple chase cards are released in the future (MH3 prerelease will likely be something I have to skip out on depending on how bad the event prices get for it).

[@unseeliedream42]

I am happy for going back to just a "normie" booster - there was too much stuff around - but I am a bit saddened by the fact price is increasing while my wage is remaining the same since 2018 :( Draft became expensive in my lgs and now it will be even more and I will be completely left out of these events The List was also an interesting idea that I see now reduced to 40 cards - it helped in the past to lower the prices for some never-reprinted cards.

[@NeutralGuyDoubleZero]

Buy singles

[@calvinbeall2068]

@@NeutralGuyDoubleZeroyou cant draft with singles - "buy singles" is advice for people who crack packs for specific cards

[@unseeliedream42]

i do already. one cannot play draft or sealed by buying singles as far as i know @@NeutralGuyDoubleZero

[@ChiisaiRamen]

@@calvinbeall2068 Buy singles (and proxies) to create a set cube. Not exactly the same as draft but it will give you a similar feeling. Im thinking of making an innistrad set cube myself

[@stuart782496]

Same pay since 2018? Bruh get a new job

[@pedrosergiot]

I like the idea of having just one booster pack. I think we were happier when there was only the booster pack instead of set boosters, draft boosters, collector's booster and whatever Hasbri creates to try to take the money from our wallets.

[@jessewinter5826]

I've been waiting for this video since it was announced. I appreciate the Professor for being informative and giving his insight when WoTC messes with our game without exaggeration or hyperbole.

[@angrywado]

As someone who has played more sealed in the last year than ever before, I am curious to see what the change will bring, but I really hope this is an overall improvement for LGSs in limiting their outlay and making it easier to stock products. Fewer products is definitely better, and a simple dichotomy between a play booster and the premium collector booster is miles better than this time last year. Worried the increase in cost, guessing about $5 per event, is going to price some folks out. Will be checking stores to see where they are landing when MaKM comes out.

[@fattybiscuit3495]

I am interested to see how this affects prereleases. I remember at my lgs they charged $40 for the Lord of the Rings set and a lot of people being annoyed about it.

[@TexasSlim13]

Normally sealed was $36 but for LOTR it was $42. I won't be surprised if the price for sealed is raised to $50 in the near future.

[@OmegaSD18]

I was annoyed as well, but I eventually read that this was specific to LOTR because there was a 30% premium WOTC had to pay to Middle Earth Entertainment. When I did the WOE prerelease, it was back to $30 at my LGS (which was basically $25 for the Prerelease pack and prize support, with everyone getting at least 1 set booster for participating, more based on wins).

[@MrOnlyXeno]

@@TexasSlim13 i only have € prices but 35€ for drafting is a lot and LOR was with 40€ crazy. For a one time thing maybe makeable but i will never go on a Monthly prerelease for more than 40€. and will never pay 50€ for one event....

[@LithmusEarth]

Instead of doing a banned and restricted announcement they did a play booster announcement, so I have read the article, and one other article that leaned closer to a review first from one of the magic reporting sites. In my local commander group i posted that "In this article they admit they are flooding local game stores with too many kinds of products. But only narrowly defined it as set vs draft. They don't even consider the larger scope." - Monday and the article was from star city games. I also said from some article, "Play boosters will be more expensive than set boosters, and are 36 boosters per box (like draft boosters)." My opinion is that these are draft boosters that have had some set booster ideas grafted onto them. Not the other way around. it's much easier to see them as what did they do with some of the common slots in a draft booster makes way more sense in my brain. Sunday Night we were discussing the pioneer cube i built with the help of this channel a couple of years ago, and how it's a more bomb-heavy environment. Well guess what, we will now get that in draft. They made a point to say they were going to design more answers at lower rarities. I might need to take a cue from that and adjust cube cobra's list.

[@ROMANTIKILLER2]

Basically WotC changed something that had been working for decades (the draft boosters), and when the new products caused vrious issues in the ecosystem, they pretended to act in the best interest of the community by changing course, with that "accidentally" removing from the market the least expensive product and replacing it with something more expensive than both discontinued options.

[@Tuss36]

They didn't change draft boosters at all, they just made set boosters because cracking draft boosters just for cards kinda sucked. Turns out a lot of folk crack packs just to open them, thus set boosters are more popular. It'd be one heck of a long con to introduce an entire new product line, produce it for several years, then discontinue the old *and* new product in place of a new one, JUST to increase the price of a pack when they could literally do that at any time for any reason they want (also said price has been said to be the same as a set booster, so what you said at the end is just a plain lie)

[@wolfman210]

If it was working set boosters wouldn't have outsold draft boosters to the point the entire format was in danger of extinction. Play boosters are just WOTC trying to save a format because the players like it.

[@samcoleman4652]

We hold a monthly draft night. So I'm very interested to see how this affects my play group. Especially since we typically buy draft boxes that have gone down in price.

[@tectronixofficial]

My play group was discussing this as well. We're all wondering if older "draft" booster boxes will go up in price due to it being a discontinued limited format experience, so to speak.

[@chrisbeynon1292]

What WoTC fail to understand is that there is only a finite amount of money to go around. We have run limited every week since Saga and have seen the price creep up over the years, from next year I expect to to be a £20 draft. On top of this our LGS will have it's 3 days of pre-release, currently £24ish and we normally play at least 2 of them. We are in a cost of living crisis here, so personally all this will do is end up reducing my ability to play limited, and lets be realistic unless you pull a bomb rare you are not making your money back off resale.

[@heronvitor6886]

i remember some emplyee of wizards said when asked about the sheer amount of products wotc was releasing: ''you need to engage in products you want to engage''. And that is the result.

[@bryanlim9817]

Gavin??

[@heronvitor6886]

@@bryanlim9817 nah. It was other dude. Blake, i think. A huge idiot for saying something like that. Troll and toad announced it was not going to buy mtg products anymore, and i think the amount of stuff they were releasing was a big factor for that decision

[@Matteodiprisco]

mark rosewater:we must save sealed format's! prerelease pack: from 25 euro to 30/35euro( yes im from to italy europe) draft:from 15 euro to 20/25 euro. my journey into sealed format will end now! thank you Mark... have a good day

[@matthewramos5162]

As more of a set booster buyer, I’ll miss my regular art cards, but I’m excited to be able to draft the packs and get the sorts of cards that I buy set boosters for!

[@Reckl3ssGring0]

I would be interested to see how each set having less commons printed into Pauper affects the format, either by stagnating it due to a lesser card pool added every year or possibly breaking it wide-open if they push design space for commons because there aren’t as many

[@falconJB]

Probably just means the better commons will be shifted up to uncommon.

[@josephrion3514]

Increased number of answers for their bombs so the removal is going up. So maybe better choices.

[@Fopenplop]

80 is still a lot, and in the article and subsequent video Q&A they talked about how before they would design dud commons to fill out the roster, so now we should expect a higher average quality of common design and less draft chaff.

[@antoniodittman5820]

Had strong feelings about how the multiple rares and list cards will warp selection order and create a greater chance of spikier deck quality. Where you will be rewarded for lucking into multiple 1 color good rares and forcing a color pair. But with fewer commons, (a thing i had missed,) we will also see less punishment for this as it means the best commons will be more likely to crop up, so when forcing a color pair you are less likely to get hosed by not seeing 2-3 of the best common enablers for your deck, they will just be more common. Conversely the uncommons become more uncommon as the pool grows so if your deck relys on a few key uncommons to really maximize potential you are best served in letting that deck pass by. Also means any uncommons that are okay buy amazing together become a worse pick because you are less likely to find its mate.

[@lukasmischlich1178]

I agree, as someone who only ever plays in person when buying a draft box with some friends, I just liked the lower power level of drafting. I already didn't like the fact that you felt the power creep with rares beeing pushed more and more, but at least it was like one card per pack, so even if someone picked a bomb they had to build around and get lucky to actually draw it. This will somewhat change the whole feel of draft more toward the way Standart became with every card having a lot of impact, which I don't enjoy as much as slowly carving out small advantages and is the reason I stopped playing constructed and only kept drafting.

[@f_c2867]

I have a friend that likes magic and I play as well but hadn’t bought boosters in over a year. For his birthday, I went to my local LGS to get him some boosters. Had like a 5min conversation trying to understand what each booster was and what the price would be, plus math for discounts if I happened to buy 4 boosters of some specific type. I ended up turning around and leaving empty handed.

[@mtgamateurnight]

I had a bet and predicted this about two years ago. I said that draft boosters would go away as it is stupid for a company to offer two products that are so similar but one is slightly more expensive but does not offer the function of the other. Clearly sales would eventually reflect this and set boosters would be modified for draft and retain the set booster price. The only reason I lost the bet was because we agreed the change would have to be announced by the end of September. I was two weeks off the mark.

[@notsaved]

basic shrinkflation by creating more expensive product line then discontinuing cheaper one, good call

[@dawildbear]

I mean as I read the announcement it sounds like this has been in the works for 2 years

[@notsaved]

@@dawildbear wonder how they predicted this 2 years ago without even knowing how well set boosters would sell! Foresight magic!

[@dawildbear]

@@notsaved set boosters have been out for like 3 years? and frankly it isn't too outlandish to go "Hey we have draft boosters and set boosters, maybe we just combine them into one product" regardless of how well set boosters specifically sell.

[@notsaved]

@dawildbear oh its not outlandish at all, it's a tried and tested corporate strategy, restructure one product into two, then remove the cheaper option and rebundle them at higher price, shrinkflation 101

[@lukasmischlich1178]

Thanks for the level headed evaluation, prof. As someone who just keeps playing in person when buying a draft box with friends, I was really bummed out by the fha fact they change the whole foundation of drafting, pushing more rares and uncomment into the format,in which I already disliked the level of power creeping and getting pushed in. Sucks a little having to spend more on a format I enjoy less and less, but I atleast understands where it's coming from. Good old wizards again having to beat out the fire they caused with a stick.

[@kaneto9974]

I was pretty devastated about draft boosters getting the axe at first, but since then i have accepted that this change had to come. The only thing i cant understand are the 14 cards per pack. As if that 1 common more per pack would be so bad, i mean they literally put cardboard ads for arena in the same booster.

[@Animusfortemorty]

For me as a casual Commander player i like this. I can buy a box of play booster to draft with out friends and still have good % to refill our shared Binder. At least for the moment it looks like a good change i repeat, for the moment

[@jiffyb333]

I've personally switched to drafting FaB. I can't keep up with all the draftable MTG sets, FaB's slower release cadence is a lot less stressful. Plus now it's going to be more affordable!

[@TheTacticalBat]

Drafting FaB is a ton of fun.

[@breakfield1944]

It's no wonder that set boosters were more popular than draft because a lot of the time the prize support (at least at my lgs) was set booster packs. It just seemed like there was more reason for a shop to have set booster packs on hand than draft. I'm glad we're returning to one product, though the price increase sucks

[@cuccooverlord9812]

After Ixalan, I'll wait to see how this plays out, and check Bloomburrow if the feedback from players is positive.

[@NobaMusic-j3u]

Good idea man, same here 👍

[@orangegalen]

Same. Checking out until Bloomburrow, since that’s the only set that looks interesting to me. Might buy a single or two, but largely I’m only playing the free EDH nights at my LGS (also largely because that’s one of my days off from work Lol)

[@ShabbahCore]

Bloomburrow is also my next stop, from Dinosaurs to Squirrels, I'm all good to go!

[@jordanlewis523]

Personally I'm thrilled things are being simplified. Coming back to magic this year after a decade plus of not playing was pretty confusing with all the new products. Your channel helped immensely in figuring things out btw.

[@seanmaertens8483]

My main reason to go to my LGS was for the prerelease. Given the price increase coming I am much more likely to just play in Arena instead and save my money for singles. This game is already very expensive to play and with a functional free alternative I would guess more people will make a similar switch to Arena over their LGS in the future.

[@markbrierley6367]

One of the "selling points" of play boosters is the increased EV over draft boosters with the increased chance of rares/mythics. In theory this is true, but in practice most rares/mythics are as much chaff as most commons are so there may be no increase in EV if WotC continues their normal design philosophies. As an anecdote: one of my LGSs has a swear jar. You can either put a bulk rare or dollar in if you get caught or you will be asked to leave. One day to prove a point a player brought in a stack of rares and just started swearing up a storm and payed the penalty each time by tossing in worthless bulk rares. He stopped when they acknowledged his point and asked him to stop, but he could have gone a few hours with the stack he brought in. As another anecdote: when we played the initial draft for Double Masters 2022 it drew a lot of players. The prize support was boosters. We had 3 pods of drafters and in the two pods I kept track of you had to go to fourth place and sixth place to find players who made returns on their buy in because of the lottery nature of packs. I came in first in my pod which rewarded 6 packs and still ended up down $20 on secondary market value on release day pricing. Certainly a price I was willing to pay in retrospect because the game play was stellar, but when the 6th place in my pod got a foil Eldrazi that more than paid her entry from her pity pack it exemplified this situation exactly. More rares does not always equate to more value.

[@dorlo7933]

While the idea of multiple rares to pick from in draft seems like it would change the format in an interesting new way, I think the price increase will push a lot of players out of regular drafting, myself included.

[@HarroTV]

I know someone posts this every day, but this one was the nail in the coffin for my magic spending, and I am glad I preserved some great draft booster boxes to draft with my friends. I am, personally, of the opinion that a draft format is best with a comparatively low average power discrepancy between rarities and as few strange "bonus slots" as possible. I noticed many players online expressed how the bonus sheets introduced with Strixhaven were super fun because they would "keep the draft format fresh", but that's the opposite of what I experienced. The only sets I enjoyed drafting within the last year or so were Dominaria United and Dominaria remastered (and, if I'm perfectly honest, Commander Masters, but that's its own can of worms). All the bonus sheet sets have been miserable for me. It may be fun to kick people down with a Skithiryx or Ragavan in a Masters set, but doing that in a Standard Set I found it felt like I might as well flip a coin. Now, with Play Boosters, not only are the bonus sheets I so dislike not going away, but ADDITIONAL variance is added to the mix, Wizards basically told me "This format is not for you", and I admit that it makes me very pessimistic about me drafting future magic sets in any meaningful way.

[@CrosswaIk]

Everything we said was going to happen with the announcement of set boosters has happened. I'm going to say now that play boosters are going to be a nightmare to try and play with in limited 😂

[@chriscunningham6401]

I can't imagine that The List cards will be usable in the draft?

[@charahnalaar]

​@@chriscunningham6401I believe all cards in Play Boosters are legal in Limited

[@naquinn5745]

​@@chriscunningham6401Oh they are

[@falconJB]

@@chriscunningham6401They have to be because they replace a playable card from the set.

[@dawildbear]

@@chriscunningham6401 ye if their not then between removing a card, replacing a card with a land, and the list you could be opening a 12 card pack which is a little tight for draft.

[@Ddot5ky]

After a nearly 5 year hiatus I came back to MTG and was so confused about what each packs were about and very few people were able to explain any of it, now that this is being changed I feel more confident buying packs again.

[@scottspencer5242]

Personally, I like this idea. It makes logistics easier for all parties involved. It also means that when I buy a box, I don't have to forego buying a box of set boosters just so my friends and I can draft with it. My only gripe is that they're still planning to include ad cards. They're pointless. If we're seeing the blasted things, we're already buying your product. If margins are so tight that you can't afford to throw in an extra common, just save the bloody cardboard and cut the packs to 14 cards.

[@zramirez5471]

Nice one prof!! As someone that stopped playing MTG prior to the evolution of the draft booster, I really found your mulligan video incredibly helpful - now I just need to make it to Commander night to get going!

[@SG7Music]

I really only play Commander, but I do try to build a new deck from a single set booster box. It will be interesting to see if this new pack makes things better or worse for that. While I may not play draft, I'm glad steps are being taken to save that experience for others.

[@folkenphoenix]

Draft booster is a very balanced set of cards, so the new booster will be better to you to build decks, rather than former set boosters.

[@24Eagle11]

Idk about this. Seems to me there won't be as much rares in these new boosters as there was in set boosters. I could be wrong but that's just what I'm getting. Will need to look at the slots and rates article.@@folkenphoenix

[@graeme5048]

Wizard's of the Coast just impaled draft and now we're just waiting for it's slow death. The players at my LGS talked last night about it, and the store bluntly told us that they would need to charge about 40 bucks CAD for a draft(3 boosters, 1 prize booster, tax). That's a the same as a prerelease,. That had to take a second to sink in: drafting a standard set will now be the same a prerelease last year, and a prerelease will be the same as my store changed for a Commander Masters draft THIS YEAR. We don't think we're going to draft anymore starting with Murders at Karlov Manor. It's too much, and everyone would rather pay 10 bucks to spend the evening playing commander or Canadian Highlander. Drafting is now the premium way to play magic; when I started playing, draft was the entry point.

[@kw759]

I think its a good step to combine the two . Only bad thing is the higher price for drafting.

[@moomixgaming9986]

I'm a casual player, and i'm 100% behind this change. Im sure stores will also appreciate the change as they will no longer need to manage 2 different booster types for each set (excluding collectors edition sham boosters).

[@jaggedtoothgrin]

One thing I hadn't seen anyone mention at all until now, and was sorta glossed past here The decrease in the number of Common Card Designs will mean that the chances of those individual commons showing up in these new Play Boosters will increase substantially, 20% more likely and, I could be wrong, I don't draft myself, but I don't recall anyone complaining that the variety of commons was just overwhelming and that they wished there were more reprints of the chaff cards. Certainly I'm sure the impact this will have on Pauper Formats will be -substantial- going forwards, and that's something I do care about, and think will suffer because of this change

[@RhodyBob]

I think it's the smart move. My LGS is getting more into drafting, so it should be nice! That and brand new players sometimes get duped into buying draft boosters expecting set booster rarities.

[@cryptocorner2253]

Back in my day, we bought a box that looked like a miniature spell book hat had a bunch of cards in it. The rarity was completely unpredictable, and that's the way we liked it. We had to walk uphill on snow covered mountains both ways to get to a local game store just to play. (Or we played in the chemistry lab on lunch in high school. But it was hard times okay! You youngins don't know how good you have it with your card sleeves, fancy foil treatment, and unfettered corporate greed.)

[@derbaer0290]

the problem is not only the increased pricing for draft via more expansive boosters but also the fact that to get the uncommons you need, you will have to open up more booster in general since there will be a bigger pool to pull from while keeping the same number of slots in play boosters.(yes buy singles folks, but this will also increase prices since most likely there will be less suply for chase cards increasing also prices on singles.)

[@modstin]

Based on the QnA in the mtg discord, and Maro's repeated immediate responds to concerns, the only issue is the price How will more uncommon affect the booster? You'll simply find less of the same uncommon, more uncommon means less a chance to have two or more of one in a draft What about more rares therefore more bombs? Common will now have better removal in general And when it comes down to it, it makes sense. Making boosters you can draft with more exciting to crack means more people will buy them, and people who only really crack set Boosters for fun might get interested in draft The price going up is bad, but if you hate rising prices, you should move to unionize your workplace so you can get better wages, that's the only way you'll get the disposable income to spend on fun things and it's the first step towards true liberation of the working class. Under true socialism we will be able to draft every friday, without fear of starvation and Sorry I was possessed by spice8rack for a few minutes there, dont know what I typed since my visions still blurry, uh, anyway I like Play Boosters

[@mopanda81]

And one of the 4 new rare slots will be the special "Good Boy List" featuring 300 different slobads

[@adamrice1651]

It doesn't really make sense. Wizards made multiple booster SKUs, and the boosters with the best value for money are what people buy. Then, because players are buying the most optimal product for money, that means draft is dying. If Wizards never made set boosters, we'd still be buying one rare draft packs and everyone would be happy.

[@modstin]

@@adamrice1651 we can say "this is wizards fault for making set boosters" all day long (and people, even the professor, are doing so) That doesnt change the straight and simple fact that MORE PEOPLE want Set Boosters, therefore making them and selling them is strictly playing to the majority of the playerbase's wishes. If you didnt like set Boosters, according to the math, you were in the minority. This change isnt to kick drafters out, it's to bring set booster buyers in

[@adamrice1651]

@@modstin "More people want set boosters" is where I disagree. If your only options are - buy a cheap cheeseburger or buy a large meal; and the company sets the prices so the large meal is better value... That doesn't mean everyone wants large meals or that they're selling 'better'. It just means customers are buying the best value for money option. Like, I think we all can agree that that for twenty years, people bought draft boosters perfectly fine... It's only after the release of set/collector boosters that this issue started. So is the issue that draft boosters weren't worth it for twenty years? Or is it that Wizards started printing more value/equity in unplayable boosters...

[@BriggsMullen]

The large majority of the sealed product I buy is pre-release kits. It's going to be a bummer that prices are going up, but I'm excited that I'll be seeing more of The List.

[@jbigs65]

I’m just happy that the frequency of the art cards are being reduced. They always feel like a waste of a slot in the set booster.

[@ottoprokke6649]

Same, but I assume that means we will get even less tokens, which honeslty annoys me a lot. Why am I getting ads in a pack I payed money for, when they could actually give me something usefull(a token)

[@cardflopper3307]

i collect the art series, I'm worried that this makes art cards harder to find

[@wildstarr]

@@ottoprokke6649 I'm at the point where I just create an image in an AI image generator and print out my own tokens. They are getting so good now I got an nice collection of goblin tokens no other person has.

[@bearmountaingaming771]

This will make me start drafting every once in a while. I never drafted because I mostly play commander and wanted the value from set boosters but now it sounds like I could get both

[@Reach_W]

My biggest concern is and always will be the accessibility of the game and I believe that raising the price of a draftable booster hurts that goal. Of particular concern, Pre-Releases will now cost about 25% more, and that's gonna price a lot of people out of one of the best entry points into the game. And I get it, with where we're at, it's a necessary move to keep the formats I love alive. But it didn't have to be this way if WotC hadn't introduced a product that contained all the fudge-coated booster fun variants and extra rares that were deliberately absent from the Draft Boosters they were purposefully priced to compete with.

[@clutchhitnick4485]

As much as i do understand the upset behind keeping the price towards the set booster price, i was never one to buy draft boosters in the first place and really have only attended one prerelease event in my whole life. But one of my favorite parts about opening set boosters was the guaranteed art card, and now to find out they arent guaranteed just disincentivizes me from buying packs at all. Sure they’re by all definition useless, but they were cool and i love the mtg art. I also felt like when i opened draft boosters, that all the cards felt the same. Hopefully these new play boosters still have the fun set booster nature to them, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

[@ESC2016]

It is "funny" how every single decision since some years now looks like it is mainly about players giving more money.

[@RrraverCrow]

$1000 for 4 packs of unplayable reprints, secret lairs, switching from intro packs to commander decks for every set, having 6+ different products for each set release, straight up telling their playerbase that some products are just “not for them”, and Mark Rosewater still has not been fired. Wotc is just cashing out before they crash this ship into an iceberg.

[@milqueto4st231]

Hi, welcome to capitalism. Can I take your order?

[@johnhague3372]

Not really the route cause is Commander which was a player shift. Since Commander took over and put draft and standard on life support they needed to find a way to get more money. The money is now from blinging your next eternal 100 card commander deck, not repeated drafts or standard deck refreshing. People did not blink standard in the same way as it rotated out. If people are just pulling or buying secret layers for certain theme looks or shiny shit for commander what did you expect WotC to do. Every single problem stems from the shift to commander and wotc wanting to make money off it. That is not to say Commander is bad. It just is what caused this. Anyone who can go to their cupboard and pull out a commander deck with the cheapest varient version of every card is allowed to disagree. The rest of us full art buying sellouts...... We did this to ourselves.

[@spartakusbund1916]

⁠@@milqueto4st231one world revolution please

[@joeferreti9442]

Every single decision by WotC in recent years made MTG worse.

[@My_Hero_Zero]

I am a draft only player and its funny because my LGS gives out set boosters as prizes for draft events, which further discourages drafting. We always specifically ask for draft boosters for prizes to draft more. I think a lot of the sales data they are citing is because they intentionally shifted the emphasis to the more expensive product. Set boosters were pitched as the new standard and they wanted it to eclipse draft boosters. To me it seems like a 5 year convoluted way to just do a price hike.

[@voltcorp]

in my country, I feel drafts and prereleases are already at the most expensive a middle-class-centered community can afford. if these events are about to get even 50% more expensive, it will really galvanize paper magic as a hobby for rich people around here

[@bpchongo-.-]

Well wotc is going to have to undo this drafts at my lgs are already barely popping on fridays with 6person pods prerelease is always a blast though

[@MTG_Scribe]

I had a long conversation with the owner of my LGS last night, and he is over the moon about the change to Play Boosters. I've only been going there for three or four months, but in that time we've had to do a number of Chaos Drafts because the story simply didn't have enough Draft Boosters of any given set to do a regular draft. While drafting is going to cost more, likely about $3 more per draft, he's confident this change is going to make drafting at smaller LGS more appealing to people and is very good for the overall health of the game.

[@nelpolian3863]

Thanks for the educating recap, Prof. Always a pleasure to see you in my new video feed.

[@fish7678]

My LGS went under. I told them we needed to play more draft. Draft was the most popular event at my LGS. They couldn't get draft packs in for us to play. Actually, they couldn't get packs into the store at all. In my whole local region, there were no packs for a year at Walmart, Game Stop, or my LGS. We got a tiny amount for a set launch, and then nothing until the next set. I even checked the next town over. Nothing. They were all filled to the brim with Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh! though. The owners did a bunch of commander tournaments to try to stay open, but couldn't keep up with rent payments. I blame WOTC. It's ridiculous.

[@Lionbug]

I only draft. Not convinced this’ll be a great change..

[@Link71386]

When this got announced, two things really got to me (and I haven't finished watching Prof's video yet): 1) they're going back to one box of boosters. Do you know what booster boxes were before "Set" and "Draft" boosters came around? Boxes of boosters, much like the "Play" boosters they're talking about. My point, THEY'RE GOING BACK TO SOMETHING THAT WORKED BEFORE. Example: when I first got into Magic, it was with the Onslaught block. Onslaught was being released and players were drafting boosters from that box. It didn't have a special name like "Set" or "Draft" booster. But it worked just fine. 2) The "Land" and "Token" card included with your 15 cards. They've essentially kept boosters at "fifteen" cards, and exchanged 2 cards that would have been playable for placeholders. So, they've effectively reduced the 15 card booster to 13 cards, and are likely going to keep them at the same, if not higher, MSRP. Both of these things serves to elaborate on one of Prof's previous videos "Product Overload." Shame on you Hasbro. EDIT: 2:46 (My hands and arms, in my mind, went up in the air in frustration.) Buy singles. 4:47 Don't count the land card. It's 13 cards. Let's be real. 9:03 YES, Professor. This is what I'm trying to say in my comment.

[@KingBobXVI]

Hopefully this probability layout remains consistent for the foreseeable future - one of the more annoying things with set boosters is that the layout keeps changing from set to set. Overall, I think this is a great change - though I see it less as the two things you said, and more that yes, they discontinued draft boosters, but just made set boosters draftable. I mean, the only real changes are to the new probability layout (which regularly changed anyway), and removing the "story" collation of set boosters, which tbh I wasn't a fan of after the first set or two (since it tends to generate very similar packs). The downside of course is that they just went with the pricing for set boosters, rather than at least averaging the two...

[@MrCrisTheRo]

Glad you addressed the jumpstart issue. Had a bunch of friends over and spent a not insignificant money on jump booster packs. Try to relive our teens, have some drinks, eat some pizza, play some magic.

[@FlameCatalyst]

I think a relevant point that isn't being discussed is how this will increase the gap between the ceiling of a good draft deck and the floor of a bad one. If someone gets incredibly lucky, they might score so much more of the key power/combo cards. But if someone gets incredibly UNlucky, their likelihood of getting even one win (even as a decent player) drops precipitously.

[@billdoetsch]

Exactly. Not many people have focused on this. This is very important for sealed especially (as in draft, at least everyone has a shared pool and mostly equal bites at the apple). But it will become prominent with Arena out of pod play- you may have to face a deck from a pod that opened many more rares than your draft pod did.

[@teamalice115]

I agree that I think this is probably the best decision because it does get confusing to know what kind of booster pack to buy. I only recently got back into Magic in the last couple of years and they always confused me when I go to a like local game store and they would ask me if I want draft or set boosters because I’m like I I don’t know I just want booster I just want I just wanna pack. So I think combining them into one will simplify it a little bit and if they’re functional is both, I think that’s probably a good idea but he’s right only time will tell really how this works out.

[@antoniodittman5820]

There is one effect on draft you can see immediately. Commons are more common and uncommons are more uncommon. Decks that rely on good commons will be more consistently draftable where as ones that require specific uncommons to really hit 10/10 will be more punishing to draft because you will be less likely to see those enablers. This also means your pack 1 pick 1 will be more of a gamble and you may more often be faced with a situation where a good uncommon enabler is a better choice than a bomb rare. The draft experience will become more difficult and the win ratio of experienced drafters will likely grow further detatched from inexperienced drafters where they had long been surprisingly close

[@falconJB]

If you want to draft by draft packs if not don't, how is that confusing?

[@siukong]

My MTG play fizzled out in ~2017-2018 due to being too busy with work. Then that break got prolonged due to lockdowns and my LGS of choice closing. Now I'm finally considering getting back into the hobby, but the fact that the price for buying packs, and/or attending a draft or prerelease has DOUBLED in just 5-6 years seems absolutely insane to me. What the hell happened?

[@stefanielinger2527]

Cynical me wants to see this as a long con to increase the price for drafting, but I can't quite convince myself that they would pull a 4 year con for this rather than just increasing the price. It's good that this is happening. It always felt bad to buy either draft or set boosters. What if the other side would have been better? Now there is no choice paralysis anymore.

[@Tuss36]

Glad to see someone else being reasonable. Many are quick to see a conspiracy in everything, when really Wizards could've just increased the price of boosters whenever they want by however much they want for whatever reason they want.

[@midnightpizzagoblin]

They'll wait for people to get desperate, and then release a "classic" draft set

[@dawildbear]

@@Tuss36 I dunno how many people are suggesting it was some cunning ploy, years in the planning. It is regardless a price hike, and that is disheartening.

[@gypsieking3280]

But... They did increase prices on all products a year or so ago. They are now using this as a chance to raise prices again.

[@thebmxreviewer]

Getting back into MTG now since I stopped in 2005. This is definitely much better as a consumer that was super confused with 4 different boosters. I also started collecting pokemon again and with that TCG I just go in and by a pack from the latest set.

[@24Eagle11]

I'm surprised I don't see much people talking about how this could fundamentally change how it is to draft sets. As an arena player (and paper) drafting has been my primary way to play since Theros Beyond Death. Drafting is a beautiful meticulous art when it all comes together. Now, to me, it seems like these will be more like mini-cubes than traditional drafting. The overall power level will increase with more rares and uncommons being in the boosters. This in turn will lower the ceiling of top drafters and raise the floor to casual drafters. A positive (for wotc, mostly) that could come from this might actually mean more people will be willing to draft despite the price increase. Especially since if they were buying packs at set booster prices anyway, hardly a difference for them. This of course negatively affects sole drafters like myself, price increase and less complexity when it comes to drafting. Will have to see how this goes but overall it doesn't seem like a good change to me for drafts turning into mini cubes.

[@shaderxluna]

I just got into magic and TCG games a month or 2 ago, and It was really really hard to learn all the stuff by myself. I appreciate it's just the play boosters and collector boosters now

[@WUBRGer_King]

Even when I had a lot more free time it was tough paying $15 a week if I wanted to draft. Assuming draft will be something like $20-25 with Play Boosters (6x3 plus extra for the store) I anticipate only going to prereleases or only drafting sets I really enjoy.

[@TigerHawk709]

The main reason I ever bought Set Boosters, was specifically to ensure that my LGS still had packs of Draft Boosters left to use for Draft nights (as they would regularly run out of Draft Boosters and not get a quick enough restock the 2nd or 3rd week after a new set). I still prefer to buy the Draft Boosters when product availability allows. To me this sounds like a solution to a problem Wizards intended to create, specifically to force the increase in price for their entire product line.

[@lucarioknightb7685]

My issue is the vplume of uncommon/commons nyugioh had a similar problem a few years back; they upgraded to having more Super rares (guarenteed 1/pack where previously i believe it had been 1/4 chance) and suddenly rares were harder to track donw than supers. Increasing the number of uncommona per set is juat going to make getting uncommons you actually want for constructed, or consistently finding signpost uncommons in limited, is going to be harder than it already was.

[@Reikosamaa]

8:00 great sense of direction during the editing there XD that said, as long as we don't get lower rates on rares and mythics i'm fine with the play boosters, makes it far easier for people who just don't know what's the difference of cards you can get.

[@captainron7120]

Very excited about this change. I prefer draft but always disappointed I can’t pull an alt art from them. This will reenergize draft (I hope)

[@SpawnofJack]

I hope this will re-energize draft too, and im excited at the prospects of being passed rares/mythics in draft more frequently

[@itsfort2098]

​@@SpawnofJacktbh for that there needs to be more Bonus Sheet stuff like with Wilds of Eldraine

[@jamestrevelyan1268]

Alt arts were always available in draft boosters though? And you could always just buy singles if you want the alt arts.

[@captainron7120]

@@jamestrevelyan1268 hmm I’m not sure about that, I guess I mean showcase arts if that helps? Yes of course I could buy singles, but I want pull them in draft, my personal favorite format. So this is great imo

[@wildstarr]

@@itsfort2098 The List cards will be draft playable.

[@dawn_oh420]

maro saying that "market forces" would magically make draft go away is so hilarious. the classic line. "sorry! the invisible hand of the market did it ! we had no other option!"

[@ryanhunter6029]

My biggest worry is not draft formats, but sealed. Draft i feel can handle the multiple rares per pack, but sealed feels so much more variable now

[@czajda]

I can't wait facing somebody with 6 bombs in their deck 😀

[@Tawanos]

I am the MTG buyer at a retail location, organizer of weekly play in the store and a player since Mirage. I wanted to say that I agree with most every point that you made. When set boosters came out I went from order 1:4 set to draft, to most recently reversing that almost completely 4:1 set to draft for Eldrain and Ixilan. I am still a fan of the Jumpstart but agree that it should be a wider set of its own rather than with set releases. I stopped carrying collector boosters almost entirely save for special releases like LoTR and Dr. Who, even the Commander Masters set I refused to carry the Collector boosters, as the set boosters were at that value point already.

[@federicokina9998]

As a great draft fan (the first format I ever played and loved of this game) I see less and less people willing to play it, since it requires more skill and more money than the 5€ modern league of FNM. The sadness of this is also amplified by the fact that - yes - FNM only costs 5€, but the deck you are bringing costs hundreds!

[@echoesvayne9790]

yeah I was just going to say... except modern is expensive as F... I have a budget deck that cost 50 dollars and 40 of that was 4 spellskites, and it holds up well against some 1000 dollar decks so it is still somewhat deck design, but still way more expensive than draft. drafting is more fun

[@Fopenplop]

I'm not even convinced it requires more skill, it's just more intimidating. A dummy like me will do decently enough at least, and I'm just grabbing rares and matching colors.

[@zeusjukem9484]

@@Fopenplop draft requires more skill and constructed is more intimidating IMO

[@ajnutable]

10:06 There's of course no way to know for certain, but my best guess as to how this will affect limited, assuming nothing else changes: -more uncommons means more variance in the uncommon slots. signpost uncommons will be harder to find, and it may be harder to build decks with good synergy. -less commons means less variance in the common slots. good cards in common, for example common removal spells, will be easier to find. -having up to 4 rares per pack will probably create more variance in general, but it'll be exacerbated in sets with powerful rares.

[@SaltySparrow]

I’m fine with less product types but honestly this will affect limited poorly and now every event will be more expensive. Not to mention a ton more rares will be opened and will be more worthless

[@brandongamer96]

I read the "draft boosters were gonna go away" line as wizards projecting lgs would stop buying them because of the overall preference for set boosters and the greater profit margin. I personally never opened draft boosters outside of drafts themselves and id imagine its much the same for most players who occasionally crack packs for fun. The change likely makes drafting more profitable for lgs and wizards is just hoping the community itself goes with it.

[@ss5gogetunks]

I'm actually mostly excited for this, when I got into magic I made a rule for myself that I would only buy packs to play limited with, not just to open. That always felt bad when draft boosters were not worth buying and setboosters were where the value was. Now I can play with those boosters and not feel like I'm making a bad decision.

[@falconJB]

They have reduced the value in from set boosters by cutting a wild card but not reduced the price so now its kind of the worst of both packs, the value of a draft pack but the cost of a set pack.

[@tapedeccard]

As it gets closer to a year of Play Boosters, I’d love to see you revisit this

[@petersehrlustig3752]

I don't really unterstand why the overall tenor on this new product seems to be rather positive. The price increase is always mentioned, but not to its fullest consequences. The major effect this product will have to Magic as a whole is purely set by its virtual price increase, the streamlining, the slots in the pack and everything else is absolutely irrelevant compared to the pricing. Booster Packs are the main source of cards for the ecosystem. Other Sealed products are missing essential cards or are designed for specific purposes and audiences. The grand majority of cards we can have access to, most of the stock of every singles inventory is coming from draft boosters and set boosters (play boosters in the future). An increase in price here (for the bigger part by making set booster prices the new minimum and for the smaller part by cutting 1/15 of the product size by omitting one playable card) elevates the pricing range of singles and therefor the hobby in general. Magic as a whole becomes more pricy with this, excluding more and more people who can't afford to participate. And Rosewaters argument that "the customers do want this because they buy more set boosters than draft boosters" ist completely ignoring all the players who don't buy boosters at all and what they're able and willing to pay. The shift in the direction of gambling and luxury, away from an accessible game, is accelerated by the introduction of play boosters. Seems that every action WotC takes and every new product they release makes Magic a little bit less affordable. Sure, the general product can handle that. One guy buying 10 packs or 10 guys buying one, the revenue is the same. And one whale hooked compensates for hundreds of budget players leaving. But the game itself won't survive this, at least not in any way that would matter.

[@zeusjukem9484]

this

[@JoshGutjahr]

I think as a newish player this is helpful to simplify things. This was already in place when I started could have saved me a lot of confusion but overall I just hope to draft and pre-releases don't become too expensive to play at stores

[@danielr8875]

Wizards made the change to split boosters into Draft and Set, now they're un-splitting them and they're getting more expensive again. Just a roundabout price increase.

[@RaccoonKid1997]

Glad I had some jumpstart packs. Me and my partner needed up putting a commander deck together with it and any cards we had. Right now it's more for fun and it's a graveyard deck.

[@Zjivarra]

Because commander is a popular format and they want to make things more universal, they should have made the play booster 20 card packs and altered the rules for draft and sealed slightly. Allow me to explain my thinking here. LIMITED FORMATS: • When drafting 3 x 20-card packs. Pick 2 cards on each of your turns. Build a 60 card minimum deck instead of 40 card. This allows you to play single player and multiplayer game in every set release. • Sealed deck becomes a 5 pack format instead of 6 pack format. Which means you get 100 cards instead of 90 cards, so a bigger side board and you should also be able to build a 60 card deck easily that will allow for 1v1 and multiplayer games. THE PRODUCT SIZE: •Booster boxes would contain 24 packs. 8 x 3 for a full draft table. 4 people can play sealed deck, and 4 packs for prizes. (two rounds total in a pod of 4 where winners play winners, and losers play losers after round 1. 2 wins = 2 packs, 1 win = 1 pack, 0 win = no pack) • Bundles contain 10 packs total so that 2 friends can do a sealed deck against each other using 5 packs each. SIDE NOTE: Bundles were too sparce with set boosters. The contents almost weighed less than the box and packaging. Since bundles went from 10 to 8 packs, it never felt good buying one. PACK DISTRIBUTION • 11 commons • 4 uncommons • 1 guaranteed rare or mythic • 1 foil wild card (common or better) • 1 booster fun slot (treatment alternate art/ showcase frame etc common or better) • 1 basic land or common non basic land • 1 DOUBLE FREAKING SIDED TOKEN please! 🙄🙄 or art card. NO MORE STUPID MARKETING CARDS, pls! PRICING • First of all. Nice round numbers that make sense for stores and consumers. • We all know if possible wizards wants us normies and non whales to roughly pay near 30 cents retail per card. 120 dollar set box price divided by 360 cards (30packsx12cards) Round numbers! • So play booster should get an MSRP of 20cards x24packs x0.3USD= 144 rounding down to 140 because you’re nice or up to 150 if you’re cool and will add box topper secret lair type promo cards to make buying a box feel awesome! • Fix your margins elsewhere and keep the price consistent for consumers for as long as possible. • Bundles (20cardsx10packs + 40 lands)x0.3 = 72 USD for bundles… Uh oh. That’s stupid. Wait… IDEA 💡! No more lands in bundles, subtract 12 and you can charge a fair 60 dollars for a bundle of 200!!! playable cards. DONE. and I did this for free, wizards. You’re welcome. I hope this message hidden in the professor’s comments, finds you well. You suck sometimes but I love ❤️ the game forever. Make better decisions, okay? 🎤🙂

[@benjaminloyd6056]

That is quite a little essay. Thank you for your time and effort.

[@thoughtsonmtg2768]

What you suggest would mean a total warp of Draft.

[@pandadotrar]

Amazing ideas and well written !

[@Zjivarra]

@@thoughtsonmtg2768 I’d be happy to listen to the reasons why you are saying that? I’m always curious about the perspective that others have on things. 🤗

[@gemma2796]

I always bought set boosters, jumpstart and draft confused me and I never really understood the difference between them all. I'm so glad there's just going to be one main booster! If they are the same price as set boosters as well then nothing will change for be bar it being easier to understand!