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Hey guys, give me a moment would you please? I’ve just come back from an ‘Extended Leave of Absence’ so I just need to find my bearings here… Ah that’s better – Hey folks, and welcome to another of my mad ramblings. You might notice a change in style off of me in the coming months; time off does that to an undead fiend. I’m hoping that the change is for the better, but either way I want to know and I am aware that this is old ground, but it is true – All feedback; Good or Bad is appreciated. So what strange and outlandish topic am I going to be talking about today you might wonder; or you would if you hadn’t already seen the title of the article (They should come with spoiler alerts…).
Now I don’t know about you but I’ve not won a Lottery, I’m not pulling down $200,000 a year and I haven’t got a wealthy Aunt who’s going to leave her millions to me in her Will – I live within my means, sometimes just barely. Now I’m not looking for a sympathetic ear, I’m not asking for handouts, I’m not even trying to teach you that ‘Someone always has it worse then you’ – I’m trying to get across the point that I have very little money, yet I still manage to play MTG – In Britain of all places and that does make a difference; it costs me around £2.50/$5 a booster here. Want to know my secret? Alright; since it you guys I guess I could help you out. I would like to point out at this point that my advice is based upon the prices for products in the UK; please take this into account when you read this article. I’ll be using UK prices but will also include the American dollar equivalent; if you operate under a different currency I suggest you visit x-rates.com/calculator.html. * Please Note: The opinions and views expressed here are not intended to be taken as gospel and it is not my intention to hurt anyone’s livelihood – I’m simply trying to help those who don’t have deep pockets to enjoy the game that little bit more. * We’ll start by examining and comparing the pro’s and con’s the different mediums and quantities in which MTG cards can be bought: Singles, Boosters, Tournament Packs and Display Boxes. Singles Vs Boosters There are countless sites out there that claim the same thing: “Cheap Commons and Reasonable Rares, right here, right now. Low costs, quickly shipped to you for your convenience!” Sorry guys, it’s not true and certainly not worth it most of the time, just follow the maths: £2.50/$5 a booster, fifteen cards a booster. That works out to about seventeen pence per card on average value. Even if you allow for the fact that rare and uncommon cards simply must cost more than commons and balance the values out as best as possible, you are still looking at ten pence a common, fifty pence an uncommon and one pound for a rare. Now how many of you can find a Dark Ritual for fifty pence? Or a Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker for a pound?
Now of course these sites and indeed most of the gaming world are declaring values based upon demand and with good business reasons too I might add. But we’re not here to talk about profit margins; we’re talking about the budget player and his game. In short, you want to buy boosters over singles whenever you’re improving your collection. You’ll note that I said ‘Most of the time’. Sometimes there is that one card that you've been hunting which is worth the singles route – These cards are usually the ‘Bomb’ cards in a given set, such as Ravnica’s Dual Lands, Damnation or Diabolic Tutor. The reason for the singles route here can best be described in maths – in a hundred boosters you will see maybe three to four copies of the same ‘Bomb’ rare at best; take into consideration you will be other rares with a higher probability of drawing and you could end up buying well over two hundred boosters just to pull the play-set you need. That’s around £250/$500 just so you can grab four cards and even if you manage to get some nice rares the chances are you will not make your money’s worth. Now consider that these cards usually run at around £10/$20, so for the full play-set you’d pay £40/$80 – that is £210/$420 difference and a guarantee that you get the four cards you want. However, to back-track just a little bit – I’d still advocate the booster route for two main reasons: Firstly cards generally trade at the values set by online websites and secondly, you add the uncommons and commons you will need to make a deck with. I’d go so far as to say that the only reason you should use a singles site over boosters is due to an upcoming tournament or for gift ideas. Boosters Vs Tournament Packs
When you consider that a booster contains fifteen cards and a pack contains seventy five; exactly five times as much and yet it only costs three times as much, you already see some of the benefit here. Then factor in that the thirty basic lands equate to the same as two boosters you realize that these cards are essentially free and short of a free lotus or one of the moxen; they are by far the best gift you could get. Despite Streetz attempts,, I have yet to see a competitive deck that runs on zero lands – it simply cannot be done. If you can prove me wrong do so, but I feel I’m backing the winner here. Basic lands are what make around 98% of decks out there run; there are some decks that run on a complete mana base of non-basic lands, but not that many. The fact you get six of each color is also a nice factor. But now to point out the downsides – You get fewer commons then you would if you went the booster route and I can almost guarantee you that you will never get the same rare twice in a tournament pack; yet it is possible for you to pull three copies of the same rare in three boosters – I know, it’s happened to me once or twice. What this boils down to is what you need; if you are simply trying to expand your card pool and increase your trading collection then Tournament packs are the route you should take, hands down. But if you’re trying to hunt down a particular rare and multiples of it, Boosters will give you better odds in this instance. Tournament Packs Vs Booster Display Boxes One box costs around £60/$120 and contains thirty-six boosters, which means a saving of around £30/$60; that means you effectively get one third of the boosters (twelve) for free. Great value right; but how many of us can gather sixty pounds up in time for a Pre-release? Card-wise there is no argument, the display case is the best solution all around but it’s simply not viable for all of us. Here’s a time when you want to be ‘fashionably late’, it will save you money. Provided your game can survive whilst you wait, it’s worth putting off purchasing a box until it rotates out of T2; I know that’s quite some time but please consider the logic behind it. Prices are dictated by those who play in tournaments and the demand they place open sets in their chosen format. Simply put, Magic is a Tournament run franchise – The game is built, run and powered by those guys with two hundred pounds a month to drop on three display cases, a few deck boxes and a handful of card sleeves. All the while, we the casual player must put up with hiked prices and the fact the cards we want will forever be “out of stock” – There are few choices open to us but the important thing is that there is a choice. The first is to run behind the times, which is by far the cheapest of the options – I’ve found websites selling Mirrodin display cases for £25/$50 and some are practically throwing Kamigawa away; simply because these cards are now dead weight to them, they can’t make profit on them anymore. This is the ideal time for you to pick them up, and in large numbers if you’ve been saving up the pennies. The same is sometimes true of stores; my local shop during my university years would let a booster go for cheap if it was outside of standard and they even threw in a free one for every four boosters I bought. They also operated a Loyalty system where every £10/$20 I spent scored me a point and every ten points was another £10/$20 for a later purchase – it sounds fairly small I know, but it built up on you very quickly (I never paid for a single Ravnica card!). So to summarize, the best route to go depends on what you’ve got in your wallet, how long you’re willing to wait for those cards and if you’re willing to put the leg-work in and shop around. In simple, bulleted points:
Trading: The Stock Market for MTG But buying cards is only one aspect on how to obtain cards – I don’t know about you but when I really, REALLY want a given card I hit the trading scene. After all, “One man’s Junk, is another man’s treasure!” and it is true; I’ve traded a Razormane Masticore for a Bayou in the past – Now some people would say I ripped the poor fellow off there but we both walked away from the trade happy so where is the harm?
It’s important to enter a trade with a clear set of goals and I suppose you could call them rules; on what you are after and what you’re willing to do/give to get what you want. Some people trade by Market value, some people trade simply on what they’re happy with and some even trade like for like; common for common, uncommon for uncommon. Personally I handle trades online and those face to face differently as I’m sure most people do; this is also my experience in general talking here. When trading online I provide the other person with a ‘Haves’ and ‘Wants’ list and we agree on a ‘Reference Source’ that we will use for the value of the cards. This way we can check to see if the other person is duping us and because we can’t actually see the cards we need some form of ‘personal insurance’ that we’re getting a fair deal. I also refuse to send first and I don’t expect the other person to do so either – A trade online involves a certain amount of trust so a simultaneous-send is my favored option here. Finally, I usually drop some free cards into the mix as a sort of ‘Thank You’ to the other person for taking part in the trade – this serves both to ensure they leave positive feedback and that they feel happy to trade with me in the future. If it costs me a few uncommons or even a couple of rares I have five couples of, what does it cost me? Now trading face to face has its own politics; and if I can help it I avoid trading on cost when doing so. The reason is that you can rest assured that the other guy is looking for the best deal and without easy access to the net or a gaming magazine I have no way to check what they state as a price. Instead, I operate on a ‘Three-Up’ system and have done ever since I started playing the game. By this I mean I’ll trade three commons for an uncommon and vice-versa; an uncommon for three commons. Sometimes this works to my advantage and sometimes I’m probably losing a fair bit on a trade but by adopting this method I have established a system that I can maintain, that people I play with know and accept and also that I can operate with comfortably. Now I’m not telling you all this in the hope that you will adopt the same method – but rather to illustrate what I mean by ‘Rules’ for a trade. Find the method that works for you; be it market value, like for like, X-up or simply just “I’ll give X for Y” – A good trade is one where you walk away happy. Organized Events Now before people start saying “Tournaments and Casual are two different things” – let me explain my angle here. I’m not suggesting you go to the Pro Tours – they cost too much for starters. No, what I’m referring to here are Local Store contests and FNM (Friday Night Magic) though I must confess I have never been to the latter, but I am a big supporter of the concept behind it. I’ll start with FNM since I have very little ground to cover here, and most of what follows is paraphrased from Wizards' own website.
Out of that, the booster draft is the most important thing to take note of – these games are an easy route to build up your collection. Now I’m not advocating ‘Rare Hunting’ here people, but by the same token if you see the fourth copy of Oblivion Ring you’ve been searching for why shouldn’t you grab it? The Alternate Art cards are a nice addition to any collection but equally as important they are generally far easier to trade and for a great value; my one copy of the Alternate Art Lotus Bloom scored me a playset of the original and a Kokusho – not a bad days trading if you ask me.
Now let’s talk store events; Flavor Country for the casual player. Usually cheaper, more fun, easier to enter and find. Gaming stores around the Globe are running small contests all the time in various formats – most of you have probably taken part in a few or possibly even run a couple. Unlike your average Sanctioned Event, store contests usually have a more relaxed tone and pace to them; this is exactly the right environment to trade in because people are more inclined to generosity when they don’t feel so pressured and generally the store manager won’t mind you talking shop in-between rounds so long as you don’t disturb other games going on. The last store event I went to I entered the place with £10/$20 and left with a fully functioning GW Lockdown deck all be it a fairly ‘soft-lock’, but a complete deck for that amount of money and an evening’s worth of gaming with good friends is a great result by anyone’s standards. Conclusion So we’ve talked about trading rules and systems: How we should enter a trade with set goals and rules before we start and that we should always leave the trade a happy person. We’ve discussed the pros and cons of boosters, tournament packs, display boxes and singles: The box is the way to go but only if you wait a while. We’ve touched upon organized events such as store events and FNM: How they can be great places to pick up choice cards in a booster draft or a nice backdrop for some light-hearted trading. Now I could leave you there and leave you cold like my chosen persona would suggest but I feel there’s one last thing I can give you before we part ways. Giving a shout out to all those who answered my research thread in advance, I present to you a list of suggested websites for buying/trading cards from:
And for those of you who play the online version of magic – www.puremtgo.com Alright folks, I feel that’s enough out of me – Now I want to hear something from you. If you’re a forum member, kick back and chat about how you go about trading or buying cards; perhaps you have a website you can suggest for buying cards from or maybe there’s something you’d like to say about the article – To use L33T speech did it “suxx0rs” or did it “r0xx0rs”; did I miss something or did I go on a bit; How do you like the change in style? Anyway Lads and Ladies, I’ve been Luthervamplord & this is the end of the article.
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Spotlights from 2008: |
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Okay,
some background information – I’m a Human being (Gasp) and as such I need a few
things to keep me alive: Air, Food and Shelter (Internet included). Because of
two (A lright, three) of these things I need to get involved with the biggest,
most vile of life’s necessary evils: Scratch/“The Green”/Denero/Cash; call it
what you will it all just means Money. 
First
consider the contents of a Tournament pack: 75 cards; 3 Rares, 10 Uncommons, 32
Commons and 30 Basic Lands. The important things to note here are the total
number of cards and the inclusion of the land cards.
...
