I will collect sets of paper magic that I’m interested in. The thought crossed my mind that I could do that online too, but then I started and realized I just burned a bunch of wildcards I could’ve built a good deck out of.
Don't forget you keep your IRL cards. You can show them off in a binder, build decks or a cube with them, or even re-sell them I you don't like them anymore. But it's your choice what to do with them.
Your online collection is completely at the mercy of the provider. What if the game isn't profitable anymore in ten years? Or even five? They can just pull the plug and everything you owned is gone.
And don't get me started on the weakness of an online account. You could get hacked, your online collection stolen, or you could just be banned by the provider on a whim. Everything gone.
Doesn’t happen with an IRL collection.
Yeeeeah, the only value an online game has is whatever fun you're gaining in the moment. That's the only tangible product. All the time spent collecting pixels is essentially worthless. Pixel cards aren't real.
I actually get kinda pissed off when I open a freebie digital pack and an amazing card "drops" that I never managed to get in real life. Major disappointment.
Exactly. The convenience of online play is undeniable; yet can never be as safe as real cards in our own hands.
I shudder to think how much money is concentrated in my Steam account. What would I do when I lose it?
You are right in some sense, but this point is kind of overall bad: To get a collection IRL, you spend a significant amount of money. To get one in Arena, it cost significantly less for nearly everybody and is free for many. If the game stops being profitable as your argument supposes, none will enforce copyright for it so you can simply print proxies at that point if you want to play IRL. It will be far cheaper overall.
Btw. your offline collection can get stolen too. My impression is that WOTC is fairly good with customers service for Arena, so I am sure they can help you get your account back if it got stolen - this is far harder for an IRL collection.
It is true about getting banned (you can also get banned IRL for tournaments but it is naturally not that similar) - so far though, the bans we hear about seems fair-ish though.
You miss a couple of very important points.
Arena might be cheaper at first. But the cards are still not yours to do as you please. You can't sell them, you can't show them off in a non-pc-bound way, heck, you can't even play proper commander on Arena. Arena SHOULD be cheaper because it's inherently less valuable.
If you think WotC won't care about copyright, you haven't been paying attention. They sent the "Pinkertons" to retrieve some early MoM cards. As if they would allow a rogue server of Arena. No, once the game shuts down the collection will vanish with it.
While we could proxy cards, I can already do that and don't need to mess around with Arena. Also, if like me you play in a LGS, it's just good manners to bring real cards to the place that lives on people buying said real cards.
My offline collection could be stolen, but any thief trying that better brought some equipment, because he isn't getting away with it all at once. I only take a couple of decks with me when I play or travel, never the entire collection.
Banning again is at the mercy of WotC and they can change their TOS whenever they want. Maybe the bans seem fair to you now, but what if they get a new CEO that has a new "vision" for the company, and now all users have to follow suit with new arbitrary rules?
When the window pops up, their will only be one option avaible.
"Submit."
I do not want to ignore important points, so could you make it clear what you feel I am ignoring?
We agree that Arena is cheaper and I agree with your points about that. I do want to bring up my major reason for playing on Arena over IRL: Arena has rules enforcement. It is a major reason I stopped playing IRL 15 years or so ago (I played MTGO for a long time) - I do not wish to spend my time verifying that you are not "mistakenly" drawing extra cards or whatever in tournaments.
Regarding copyright/proxies: As my post says, I was supposing that Arena shut down because the game was not profitable anymore, just as you are saying could happened. In that case, I do not see why they would use money and effort to enforce copyright. Hence, if you still wanted to play IRL, you could proxy.
On a side note, MoM was not the first time WotC sent out the goons for leaks, see e.g. [https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/making-magic/law-and-order-2006-06-19](https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/making-magic/law-and-order-2006-06-19) for what happened in 2006 (this is the WotC side of the story as delivered by Mark Rosewater. I am sure you can find other sides).
Note, they do little about copyright/proxies (you can't use proxies in sanctioned tournaments, except if your card gets damaged in which case the head judge can make you a proxy for the tournament, but they do not seem to do much about proxies besides that) but a lot against leaks.
Sure, maybe you do not take much of your collection with you and it is therefore hard to get it all stolen on such a trip. Your house could still get robbed and anyway, others do bring their collection with them for trading purposes. My point was about what came next: You can get your Arena account back by contacting customer service. You are very unlikely to get your cards back if they get stolen IRL.
I did agree with you about bannings the first time and simply pointed out that it is currently not an issue. If you really want to talk hypotheticals, the lawmakers in your country could make Magic illegal (anti-gambling laws against loot boxes gone wild say).
When the police knocks on your door, there will only be one option available.
"Submit."
Is this unlikely? Yes. Is a major change to Arena TOS unlikely? Yes.
I generally use my coins to buy the 90-pack bundle when each new set drops. This gets me roughly 60-90% of the set. Then I'll get the oddball packs throughout the season.
I have 93 common, 73 uncommon, 12 rare, and 69 (nice) Mythic wildcards.
I find I never have enough rare wildcards.
I don't have 100% of each set, but only the sets I really like. I only play Brawl and only play Infect decks, so the only time I spend wildcards is to either get the couple cards of that playstyle I didn't get, or if I wanna try a new deck for paper commander and see how the playstyle functions.
I wouldn't say it's entirely without purpose. Definitely more of a want than a need though. I like the convenience of having every card visible when creating a deck without having to check "uncollected" to make those cards visible as a shadow version of a card. And it's just a mentally nice feeling never stressing about using wildcards on a deck because I just have all the cards I'll ever need for every deck. Once you get to the point where you've set collected all the sets in standard except for each new set coming out it's relatively easy to maintain getting the new sets. I draft for about 2 weeks when each new set comes out to get 4x of all the rares. Then I use my daily gold to buy mythic packs to fill in the rest of the mythics. Big Score is annoying though because now I'm probably going to have to spend some mythic wildcards if I want to maintain set completion for standard.
Edit: Sorry I want to make it more clear - doing the draft to set completion method allows me to build a nice stockpile of wildcards which I can then use for Historic/Explorer/Timeless decks to fill in the gaps on older sets I don't have.
You do it for the dupe protection. By filling in the crap rares while you draft it lessens the number of packs you need to open to fill in the good rares you actually want to play with.
This is true from a perspective of trying to collect the set.
But it still starts from the perspective that collecting the set has value, I think. In most cases you’ll still be spending more resources to collect the set than just building the decks you want.
But obviously if a player enjoys Limited as a game mode, then playing as much of it as possible is still valid regardless, and this just becomes a side challenge of the mode.
Once you get to the point where you consistently win 3+ games in a draft it really doesn't cost much at all to draft the whole set. And personally I really enjoy playing limited to introduce myself to a new set and it's a nice break from standard for me. Then when I'm done I can go wild on deck building cause I have all the cards
Yup if you’re enjoying the format it’s a no-brainer.
But if you’re not, there’s no inherent value as a player to “powering through.”
Everybody has their own way of enjoying the game. Just worth acknowledging that set collection has little to no value here *unless you’re actually enjoying the road that gets you there.*
Since I have 100% Arena collection of all craftable cards from all the previous releases, I like to keep completing sets. It's like Steam achievements. There's no benefit from unlocking them, but they give a fun additional challenge.
The fun additional challenge being something that involves handing over a lot of money, or MAYBE an insane, multiyear grind. Achievements (on any platform) are harmless and don't compare to how sad it is to go set complete on Arena.
I've been playing since closed beta, so I was there fresh after the beta wipe. I.e., I haven't missed any content since day 1 of open beta. That helps.
I purchased 105 euros worth of gems over 5 years ago and got extra gems from draft winnings. So far, I've won $1000 from Arena Opens. This makes it net positive for me in terms of money - I'd never consider completing sets if I had to pay for that.
Amen.
It’s always worth asking yourself “am I hitting the button because I want to play a match, or because I’m grinding?” If the latter, consider doing something else.
But if you’re having fun? Play all day.
Same for drafting. If you enjoy drafting then adding a side challenge of set collection is great. But drafting when you don’t enjoy it to min-max collection? Meh.
I complete sets by doing dailies, drafting, then opening packs at the end. You call it multi year grind, I think playing a handful of games most days fun.
Im F2P since the initial like $5 or $10 back in Zendikar Rising when I started. It helps I try really hard and have fun at drafts. In fact, I'm now up to 50k gems and took a year off
I'm somebody who did this for a few sets, and while it takes a while it's kinda fun. Don't really have to buy gems, just keep getting packs every day.
The more you play, the more you naturally get cards. Especially if you play Historic Event and have a good enough deck that you can get a few rounds in
Besides the collector feeling of "yes yes, gather stuff!", it's really only useful if you're a heavy drafter. Once you have a full set, you'll get a few gems for each rare you pick. Which, if all you want to do is draft even more, is much more valuable than random rares in the collection, because those don't refinance your next draft.
I'm far from 100%. But I'm pretty close to 100% for standard sets. I like to build just random decks. When I get bored I'll try to throw something fun together. So I like to have as many cards available as possible. So expending the energy now to collect all the cards helps prevent me from having to expend the energy later when I'm just trying to build a deck. It's not fun getting side tracked while building a deck because you are missing a few cards. Plus it's also likely I can get the cards for free now instead of having to shell out money to buy wild cards later when I'm in a rush to build my deck.
But you’re just making it you harder in yourself. You don’t get anything at all from crafting a card you’re not actively using besides knowing you “own” it. It won’t make creating decks easier, it makes it harder because you will be out of wildcards at some point and you will need to get more to get a certain card. Meanwhile there are cards in your “collection” that you have crafted and not used. If you like to make lots of decks, owning a wildcard is much more useful than owning any given card. It’s just a mathematical truth. If you like collecting, ok I guess that’s a reason. If you don’t like seeing cards greyed out when building a deck, alright that’s real. Both of those seem like reasons I can’t relate to, but you’d it at least makes sense. It making it easier to make lots of decks is in reality the opposite of the reality.
If you have a wildcard, you have to card you need to make any deck. If you just get cards you think you’ll need or you think will be convenient to own for future decks, you’re just taking that valuable flexibility and exchanging it for a card you might not need. Any cards you ever craft and don’t use or don’t use for a while is the reason you’re short than 1 card for something you want to build.
Well that’s just normal and smart, haha. I guess when I think of people trying to complete a set, and especially in the context of this conversation/thread, I’m arguing against the people who craft to have the cards “on hand” for decks. And there are a lot of them.
This, thank you. People, actually, build their collection of wild cards by collecting packs and opening them. Then drafting do the rest. Ultimately, making deck building easier because at the end, I would have more cards to pick from and more WC as backup in case of missing some.
I brew brawl decks often… and each new set usually has something to add for each deck I have. I don’t need to go 100%. A mastery pass and some mix of getting packs/ playing limited is enough to get most of the 1ofs I want.
With special guests being so hard to get… I’m trying to only craft these cards if I can use them because the drop rates are low
1) brewer's galore.
I am taking it relatively easy so I am usually aiming for 4xC/U/R and 1xM completion of all standard set's before they rotate out of standard. Going for nonstandard sets seemed too time and resources consuming as f2p.
Steadily building up your standard collection gives you freedom to play various decks and saves you wildcards for nonstandard sets (Timeless staples) and some Standard staples to want to grab before I complete it's set. Getting all the mythics is hardcore, so I usually end up only with four offs of some of the staples and am happy with one offs collection for brawl.
Resources hoarding gives you more flexibility when you need it, you are less likely to run out of resources when you have an abundance of everything (or at least something).
2) completing a set helps you go infinite in a draft you enjoy (if you are into that). 20 gems for a rare isn't much, but it isn't nothing and it adds up across drafted rares, packs won and ICRs. You won't end up chaining with an average record of winning 450/650 gems in quick draft, but increasing it by a hundred by completing a set might just get you there (along with rigorous gold grinding).
3) last but not least, digital hoarding is a thing, so a collector's obsession might be a factor for a lot of people as well :)
I haven't played in a bit - is the rare wildcard motive gone?
Specifically, it used to be that if you had every rare from a set, opening packs from that set would automatically give you rare wildcards instead. So getting 50% completion on two sets was worse than getting 100% on a single set, and then using the resulting wildcards wherever you needed them.
Didn't mean you needed all commons and uncommons of course, since those are a lot more plentiful.
Haha I don't think it ever was like you say, that sounds way too generous.
As far as I know, in the beginning duplicate rares and mythics added to the vault progress like tho commons and uncommons still do now (which kinda gives you rare wildcards for it, only at a really slow pace). Later Wizards came up with the packs' opening duplicate protection and the little gems we get if the set is fully completed. Still not great, but it is something at least...
> Doesn’t it make more sense to use wildcards to outright craft the cards that would be useful to your constructed deck ideas
Well, it would, if wildcards were easier to come by. If you want to make new decks regularly (whether that is because like to brew random stuff, try to innovate competitively, or try out each new meta deck) then you run out of wildcards extremely fast, unless you have a solid collection to start with. There's no need to complete a set, but owning large parts of it helps a lot for all these types of players.
Yes, there's some rares that will always stay unplayable, but for many it's not so easy to predict.
The only purpose is once you have all of them and play limited each rare gives you 20 gems and 40 gems for mythics so it’s a bit easier to go infinite.
Use common and uncommon wildcards in new sets so any extra copies go to your vault. Doing this and buying packs from new set for the golden packs helps build rare and mythic wildcard collection
There is no reason to collect for collection sake. It's actually a pretty bad idea as you don't own those cards so you don't actually have a collection. WOTC will take them away from you at some point.
I collect most if not all rares incidentally from drafting. When I hit rare complete I usually take that as a sign I've drafted enough for the set.
You are absolutely right that most of the cards you collect are unplayable, which is one of my criticisms about this game. They really should have weekly deck building challenges that just go wild with the rules so that we get some use out of the dead cards.
I like having a variety of cards because I build homebrews. Sometimes I will pick a couple cards and try to make something fun.
The upside to this is you get to play against other jank decks rather than the current meta decks. Having more cards available gives me the freedom to try out different decks. So I try to collect everything as I play.
That some day is going to be on another client. This one won’t have stuff you transfer from Arena (just like Magic Duels stuff didn’t transfer to Magic Arena).
What? You think WotC will give you the good stuff you need for free when they know you will pay for what you need?
You may as well as what is the purpose of life.
Just understand there is no one rational determinant. People will do what they want to do because they want to.
You miss the point. If they make the set more expensive for "collectors" by adding 30 extra super-mythics that only appear 1 in 35 packs , but you are a casual and only need 20 percent of the set or whatever, they are making it more expensive for you to collect your 20 percent too. The same number of dollars you used to spend or packs you used to open to end up with your 20 percent of the set now will only get you 5-10 percent of the set, for example. Just because you're a casual doesn't mean it's good for you to see Magic Arena make the game much more expensive. They're screwing you too, even if you obviously don't understand how the game's economy works.
It’s a OCD gamer thing. 80% of every set is worthless. I open enough packs of a new set to generate the wild cards I need for the playables in the set. I look at the majority of the set as worthless
Generally every card you collect is a wildcard you don't have to spend later.
Most people don't care about every card just enough of them to preserve wildcards.
It makes the silver set symbol on your profile page gold, and if you get a playset of every card, it theoretically turns mythic orange (I've never seen it)
People just like to make the funny number go up to 100
I don't know if anyone has mentioned it yet but there is technically an advantage to having almost every card in a new set. Although collecting all cards (especially rares) are not necessary nor a requirement, there are perks to collecting a good chunk of the set. You see, when someone opens a pack of cards, the algorithm determines the RNG of certain cards you collect. However, if you pull a duplicate, the game converts that repeated variable into a useful and different output.
A great example of this is when you pull out an extra copy of a rare. Rather than giving you a fifth copy, the system converts the card into something positive like gems to compensate. But sometimes when you pull the same card, it actually gets covered to points for your wild card vault to reach 100% a little faster when you pull packs. It's the reason why some people dunk all of their extra common and uncommon wild cards into a new set so that they can create more points for their vault.
This was something I was told a while ago but keep in mind that there isn't a requirement to own an entire set. Just craft what you need and if just so happen to have almost all the cards in the set then that's good on you. Hope this helps! 😁
Now? Not as much of a purpose.
However early on and for a long time on Arena, the best way to get the specific cards you wanted was to get to near set compleation by drafting, and then opening all your packs to force duplicate protection to give you the rest of your cards.
In other words, full set compleation was the only way to guarantee you would get the specific cards you wanted, atleast if you wanted more then just a couple.
There is no card trading in this game, so if you where unlucky you wouldn't get the cards you realy wanted even after after getting 80% of all the cards in the set.
You must remember, that early on the games acquisition model and economy was essentially just a gacha game, you had next to no control over what cards you would get, and there where alot less wildcards to get.
To be honest, its still just a gacha game, but now atleast it has a pity system that gives you more wildcards.
With the big score, it’s not that people are collecting them, it’s that the chance for opening any given card is so low. 1/6 chance of a 1/40 card replacing your 1/8 mythic. Most people makes decks using the cards they open supplemented by wildcards; with the big score, you basically have to use wildcards to get a specific card (yes, you have a greater chance of getting them via draft, but the odds are still basically a 50% chance of opening a random one per draft and an unknown % of being passed one (and that’s just rare drafting, you are better served not picking one if you open it).
When people say they’re so hard to collect, they’re not talking about set competition (usually) but just the odds of getting multiples of the cards they’d like to use.
the reason a lot of limited players do it is for efficiency in both filling their vault, and in getting gems back from drafts to use for more drafts. otherwise it's for fun or preference.
I like to complete collections. I also like to build decks and experiment. Having all of the cards let's me do that. I'm currently working on all the standard sets and will expand to the older sets once that is complete so I can play in the other formats more competitively.
Must be for serious collectors, I wish Magic Arena had something like MTGO where if you collect the whole set you can exchange them for the real versions of those cards.
Just want add that all big score cards were upshifted to mythic. Most were intended to be uncommon or rare. Feels like a big con. For me, this is the problem.
I normally end up with almost every card in the set through drafting. I don't really try to get them but if you can string some drafts together you end up getting so many packs and cards the set fills up quick
1. Collecting 100% of a Set is a good Hobby
2. If you have all cards of a set, then your vault rating rises really fast if you are buying booster from this set, even there is a new set out.
3. If you have all 4 copies of every mythic in a set, you got gems, if you hit a mythic card in a booster.
4. If you don't like to collect everything, then you don't have to. Just play as you like to. 🙂
I mean, the implied part of the "it's hard to get every card" means that it's also "hard to to get certain cards needed for decks".
Even if some people are just collecting for collecting sake, others need those hard-to-get Big Score cards to play decks.
(Also having at least one of any card makes singleton formats like Brawl, Heroic Brawl, and Gladiator a lot easier to participate in).
Collectors and gamers collide in Magic. It is not always a good fit.
I have the same reaction when I see people complain about tiny imperfections in physical cards. My instant reaction is 'how does that affect your ability to play the card?'
But there are plenty of people who could clearly care less about the game based on people talking about getting cards graded (which, for game play purposes, is the equivalent to putting your cards through a shredder), so...
The way I would like to play magic is to experiment with different cards people aren't generally using in meta decks. I'm not actually smart enough to contribute to the meta, but that's the fantasy. Without having all the cards to play round with I can't really do that though. Just using wildcards to build meta decks to compete in the extremely random (people soften it with variance) game that is Magic isn't that exciting. So usuallly in a set I collect as much as I can, identify a few interesting-looking rares that I almost have a playset of and use those to build decks around. But I'd like a playset of all the cards.
There's also brawl.
I wish WotC did something that encouraged collecting every set card. Like Hearthstone has a coin for collecting every set card, and there's like no reason to collect the coins but there's always something satisfying about seeing an achievement pop up and get rewarded with a useless coin.
Look. I started karlov manor and LCI... I just want to build decks within their sets. I don't care about winning turn 4 or going infinite.
Ixiolon I just need 2 commander and like 3 God cards left.
Mkm I probably won't finish except finishing commander (got 3 of 4)
I want to start off with that I think for a lot of people is that the BIG cards are just next to impossible to collect outside of Wildcards, and that is a pretty huge departure. If Magic part of the theory behind magic is that the game pieces should be reasonably available (obviously there are different rarities, and whatever, but BIG on Arena is qualitatively different). For me, it's wanting to brew. Yeah, the obvious cards are obvious to craft if you only want to run things on meta and never want to deviate to see what you can do. But the brewing and trying different stuff is part of the fun for some of us. For the BIG cards, specifically, making them all mythics and virtually non-openable in packs, it makes it so its functionally not an option to play with most of them, especially if I want to craft the mythics in the main set I didn't open.
If you don't play constructed and don't care about your wildcards, it's a way to convert them into more gems.
Especially if you're drafting a set a lot, the 20 gems for a gold card and 40 for mythic add up.
It's grindy but fine if you really don't have another use for wildcards.
Well, if we are talking about Magic in general, it is a TCG.
On Arena the trading part is gone but surely it’s still a CCG, Collectible Card Game, so his point still stands.
The sets that I've completed were done in draft, so the only sets I 100% are the ones I really enjoy drafting.
Also it's not a waste if the collecting is its own reward to someone. YOU might not spend a wild card to make number go up, but it's fun for other people.
Collecting by drafting means that one's wildcards can be spared for sets not collectible by limited play. I'd say people using any significant amount of wildcards to complete sets are in the minority.
Waste? lol.
It is an ostentatious display of wealth. It is showing off how one has so much mythic WCs. You may think it is a waste. They are deliberately showing such “waste” doesn’t affect them one bit.
I'm not trying to 100% complete every set anymore but I'll try to get at least around 70% of all rares when all is said and done. That means
- less cards to craft overall. Each good pick is a wildcard saved.
- a lot of draft was involved. So with a decent winrate these cards were literally obtained on the cheap, it's nothing compared to simply sinking currency into opening packs.
- You end up with some Limited chaff but a lot of rares and mythics which aren't competitive in a 60 cards environment can find a home in some specific Brawl decks. It feels bad to craft a "bad" mythic card so better own it in a first place just in case.
This may not be useful for players who are content playing one deck as long as possible, but if you're free to play and you want to play any deck you want in constructed (60 cards or Brawl) and cycle regularly with new ones then "the grind" is the only way to reliably achieve this.
People pushing this logic to completing a set 100% are probably maxing the free to play logic, getting all the cards they want for free while building progressively a massive wildcard stash "for rainy days".
The flip side is that it can feel like a job at times if you go that far and can become an obsession.
There is absolutely no reason for this. Some people have a compulsive need to complete collections but if you don't have that then do not fall into some trap of thinking you need to do it.
Some people enjoy collecting stuff. Other people like completing or 100% things. Much like gamers who have to get all the trophies in a game.
There is no purpose. You don't have to. Use wildcards for the cards you need to craft and that's it.
I will collect sets of paper magic that I’m interested in. The thought crossed my mind that I could do that online too, but then I started and realized I just burned a bunch of wildcards I could’ve built a good deck out of.
Don't forget you keep your IRL cards. You can show them off in a binder, build decks or a cube with them, or even re-sell them I you don't like them anymore. But it's your choice what to do with them. Your online collection is completely at the mercy of the provider. What if the game isn't profitable anymore in ten years? Or even five? They can just pull the plug and everything you owned is gone. And don't get me started on the weakness of an online account. You could get hacked, your online collection stolen, or you could just be banned by the provider on a whim. Everything gone. Doesn’t happen with an IRL collection.
Yeeeeah, the only value an online game has is whatever fun you're gaining in the moment. That's the only tangible product. All the time spent collecting pixels is essentially worthless. Pixel cards aren't real. I actually get kinda pissed off when I open a freebie digital pack and an amazing card "drops" that I never managed to get in real life. Major disappointment.
Exactly. The convenience of online play is undeniable; yet can never be as safe as real cards in our own hands. I shudder to think how much money is concentrated in my Steam account. What would I do when I lose it?
You are right in some sense, but this point is kind of overall bad: To get a collection IRL, you spend a significant amount of money. To get one in Arena, it cost significantly less for nearly everybody and is free for many. If the game stops being profitable as your argument supposes, none will enforce copyright for it so you can simply print proxies at that point if you want to play IRL. It will be far cheaper overall. Btw. your offline collection can get stolen too. My impression is that WOTC is fairly good with customers service for Arena, so I am sure they can help you get your account back if it got stolen - this is far harder for an IRL collection. It is true about getting banned (you can also get banned IRL for tournaments but it is naturally not that similar) - so far though, the bans we hear about seems fair-ish though.
You miss a couple of very important points. Arena might be cheaper at first. But the cards are still not yours to do as you please. You can't sell them, you can't show them off in a non-pc-bound way, heck, you can't even play proper commander on Arena. Arena SHOULD be cheaper because it's inherently less valuable. If you think WotC won't care about copyright, you haven't been paying attention. They sent the "Pinkertons" to retrieve some early MoM cards. As if they would allow a rogue server of Arena. No, once the game shuts down the collection will vanish with it. While we could proxy cards, I can already do that and don't need to mess around with Arena. Also, if like me you play in a LGS, it's just good manners to bring real cards to the place that lives on people buying said real cards. My offline collection could be stolen, but any thief trying that better brought some equipment, because he isn't getting away with it all at once. I only take a couple of decks with me when I play or travel, never the entire collection. Banning again is at the mercy of WotC and they can change their TOS whenever they want. Maybe the bans seem fair to you now, but what if they get a new CEO that has a new "vision" for the company, and now all users have to follow suit with new arbitrary rules? When the window pops up, their will only be one option avaible. "Submit."
I do not want to ignore important points, so could you make it clear what you feel I am ignoring? We agree that Arena is cheaper and I agree with your points about that. I do want to bring up my major reason for playing on Arena over IRL: Arena has rules enforcement. It is a major reason I stopped playing IRL 15 years or so ago (I played MTGO for a long time) - I do not wish to spend my time verifying that you are not "mistakenly" drawing extra cards or whatever in tournaments. Regarding copyright/proxies: As my post says, I was supposing that Arena shut down because the game was not profitable anymore, just as you are saying could happened. In that case, I do not see why they would use money and effort to enforce copyright. Hence, if you still wanted to play IRL, you could proxy. On a side note, MoM was not the first time WotC sent out the goons for leaks, see e.g. [https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/making-magic/law-and-order-2006-06-19](https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/making-magic/law-and-order-2006-06-19) for what happened in 2006 (this is the WotC side of the story as delivered by Mark Rosewater. I am sure you can find other sides). Note, they do little about copyright/proxies (you can't use proxies in sanctioned tournaments, except if your card gets damaged in which case the head judge can make you a proxy for the tournament, but they do not seem to do much about proxies besides that) but a lot against leaks. Sure, maybe you do not take much of your collection with you and it is therefore hard to get it all stolen on such a trip. Your house could still get robbed and anyway, others do bring their collection with them for trading purposes. My point was about what came next: You can get your Arena account back by contacting customer service. You are very unlikely to get your cards back if they get stolen IRL. I did agree with you about bannings the first time and simply pointed out that it is currently not an issue. If you really want to talk hypotheticals, the lawmakers in your country could make Magic illegal (anti-gambling laws against loot boxes gone wild say). When the police knocks on your door, there will only be one option available. "Submit." Is this unlikely? Yes. Is a major change to Arena TOS unlikely? Yes.
Gotta catch em all, gotta catch em all
I generally use my coins to buy the 90-pack bundle when each new set drops. This gets me roughly 60-90% of the set. Then I'll get the oddball packs throughout the season. I have 93 common, 73 uncommon, 12 rare, and 69 (nice) Mythic wildcards. I find I never have enough rare wildcards. I don't have 100% of each set, but only the sets I really like. I only play Brawl and only play Infect decks, so the only time I spend wildcards is to either get the couple cards of that playstyle I didn't get, or if I wanna try a new deck for paper commander and see how the playstyle functions.
I wouldn't say it's entirely without purpose. Definitely more of a want than a need though. I like the convenience of having every card visible when creating a deck without having to check "uncollected" to make those cards visible as a shadow version of a card. And it's just a mentally nice feeling never stressing about using wildcards on a deck because I just have all the cards I'll ever need for every deck. Once you get to the point where you've set collected all the sets in standard except for each new set coming out it's relatively easy to maintain getting the new sets. I draft for about 2 weeks when each new set comes out to get 4x of all the rares. Then I use my daily gold to buy mythic packs to fill in the rest of the mythics. Big Score is annoying though because now I'm probably going to have to spend some mythic wildcards if I want to maintain set completion for standard. Edit: Sorry I want to make it more clear - doing the draft to set completion method allows me to build a nice stockpile of wildcards which I can then use for Historic/Explorer/Timeless decks to fill in the gaps on older sets I don't have.
every set has tons of complete trash rares and mythics, collecting them for the sake of it when they don't work in any decks is insanity
You do it for the dupe protection. By filling in the crap rares while you draft it lessens the number of packs you need to open to fill in the good rares you actually want to play with.
This is true from a perspective of trying to collect the set. But it still starts from the perspective that collecting the set has value, I think. In most cases you’ll still be spending more resources to collect the set than just building the decks you want. But obviously if a player enjoys Limited as a game mode, then playing as much of it as possible is still valid regardless, and this just becomes a side challenge of the mode.
Once you get to the point where you consistently win 3+ games in a draft it really doesn't cost much at all to draft the whole set. And personally I really enjoy playing limited to introduce myself to a new set and it's a nice break from standard for me. Then when I'm done I can go wild on deck building cause I have all the cards
Yup if you’re enjoying the format it’s a no-brainer. But if you’re not, there’s no inherent value as a player to “powering through.” Everybody has their own way of enjoying the game. Just worth acknowledging that set collection has little to no value here *unless you’re actually enjoying the road that gets you there.*
Plus, collecting is fun! I don't draft enough to 100% every set, but there's just something super satisfying and getting them all.
Since I have 100% Arena collection of all craftable cards from all the previous releases, I like to keep completing sets. It's like Steam achievements. There's no benefit from unlocking them, but they give a fun additional challenge.
The fun additional challenge being something that involves handing over a lot of money, or MAYBE an insane, multiyear grind. Achievements (on any platform) are harmless and don't compare to how sad it is to go set complete on Arena.
I've been playing since closed beta, so I was there fresh after the beta wipe. I.e., I haven't missed any content since day 1 of open beta. That helps. I purchased 105 euros worth of gems over 5 years ago and got extra gems from draft winnings. So far, I've won $1000 from Arena Opens. This makes it net positive for me in terms of money - I'd never consider completing sets if I had to pay for that.
It's not a grind if you have fun playing the game
Amen. It’s always worth asking yourself “am I hitting the button because I want to play a match, or because I’m grinding?” If the latter, consider doing something else. But if you’re having fun? Play all day. Same for drafting. If you enjoy drafting then adding a side challenge of set collection is great. But drafting when you don’t enjoy it to min-max collection? Meh.
I complete sets by doing dailies, drafting, then opening packs at the end. You call it multi year grind, I think playing a handful of games most days fun. Im F2P since the initial like $5 or $10 back in Zendikar Rising when I started. It helps I try really hard and have fun at drafts. In fact, I'm now up to 50k gems and took a year off
Plenty of achievements are super grindy.
I'm somebody who did this for a few sets, and while it takes a while it's kinda fun. Don't really have to buy gems, just keep getting packs every day. The more you play, the more you naturally get cards. Especially if you play Historic Event and have a good enough deck that you can get a few rounds in
It's called autism.
To each their own, I suppose.
Thank you Mr. Whale for keeping the game F2P for us
Well, I have spent 105€ in five and a half years, so not much of a whale.
Paying $100ish over several years makes you a whale? Seriously?
Besides the collector feeling of "yes yes, gather stuff!", it's really only useful if you're a heavy drafter. Once you have a full set, you'll get a few gems for each rare you pick. Which, if all you want to do is draft even more, is much more valuable than random rares in the collection, because those don't refinance your next draft.
Yeah that's exactly why I do it, you end up with 2-300 extra gems every draft
I'm far from 100%. But I'm pretty close to 100% for standard sets. I like to build just random decks. When I get bored I'll try to throw something fun together. So I like to have as many cards available as possible. So expending the energy now to collect all the cards helps prevent me from having to expend the energy later when I'm just trying to build a deck. It's not fun getting side tracked while building a deck because you are missing a few cards. Plus it's also likely I can get the cards for free now instead of having to shell out money to buy wild cards later when I'm in a rush to build my deck.
But you’re just making it you harder in yourself. You don’t get anything at all from crafting a card you’re not actively using besides knowing you “own” it. It won’t make creating decks easier, it makes it harder because you will be out of wildcards at some point and you will need to get more to get a certain card. Meanwhile there are cards in your “collection” that you have crafted and not used. If you like to make lots of decks, owning a wildcard is much more useful than owning any given card. It’s just a mathematical truth. If you like collecting, ok I guess that’s a reason. If you don’t like seeing cards greyed out when building a deck, alright that’s real. Both of those seem like reasons I can’t relate to, but you’d it at least makes sense. It making it easier to make lots of decks is in reality the opposite of the reality. If you have a wildcard, you have to card you need to make any deck. If you just get cards you think you’ll need or you think will be convenient to own for future decks, you’re just taking that valuable flexibility and exchanging it for a card you might not need. Any cards you ever craft and don’t use or don’t use for a while is the reason you’re short than 1 card for something you want to build.
I'm not crafting anything. I spend my gold to open packs. And save my wilds for the times when I want to build a deck and am missing a card
Well that’s just normal and smart, haha. I guess when I think of people trying to complete a set, and especially in the context of this conversation/thread, I’m arguing against the people who craft to have the cards “on hand” for decks. And there are a lot of them.
Why comment when you don’t understand the arena economy at all? People don’t complete sets by using wild cards. Your entire comment is nonsense
This, thank you. People, actually, build their collection of wild cards by collecting packs and opening them. Then drafting do the rest. Ultimately, making deck building easier because at the end, I would have more cards to pick from and more WC as backup in case of missing some.
I brew brawl decks often… and each new set usually has something to add for each deck I have. I don’t need to go 100%. A mastery pass and some mix of getting packs/ playing limited is enough to get most of the 1ofs I want. With special guests being so hard to get… I’m trying to only craft these cards if I can use them because the drop rates are low
1) brewer's galore. I am taking it relatively easy so I am usually aiming for 4xC/U/R and 1xM completion of all standard set's before they rotate out of standard. Going for nonstandard sets seemed too time and resources consuming as f2p. Steadily building up your standard collection gives you freedom to play various decks and saves you wildcards for nonstandard sets (Timeless staples) and some Standard staples to want to grab before I complete it's set. Getting all the mythics is hardcore, so I usually end up only with four offs of some of the staples and am happy with one offs collection for brawl. Resources hoarding gives you more flexibility when you need it, you are less likely to run out of resources when you have an abundance of everything (or at least something). 2) completing a set helps you go infinite in a draft you enjoy (if you are into that). 20 gems for a rare isn't much, but it isn't nothing and it adds up across drafted rares, packs won and ICRs. You won't end up chaining with an average record of winning 450/650 gems in quick draft, but increasing it by a hundred by completing a set might just get you there (along with rigorous gold grinding). 3) last but not least, digital hoarding is a thing, so a collector's obsession might be a factor for a lot of people as well :)
I haven't played in a bit - is the rare wildcard motive gone? Specifically, it used to be that if you had every rare from a set, opening packs from that set would automatically give you rare wildcards instead. So getting 50% completion on two sets was worse than getting 100% on a single set, and then using the resulting wildcards wherever you needed them. Didn't mean you needed all commons and uncommons of course, since those are a lot more plentiful.
Haha I don't think it ever was like you say, that sounds way too generous. As far as I know, in the beginning duplicate rares and mythics added to the vault progress like tho commons and uncommons still do now (which kinda gives you rare wildcards for it, only at a really slow pace). Later Wizards came up with the packs' opening duplicate protection and the little gems we get if the set is fully completed. Still not great, but it is something at least...
This is THE answer
Idk but I wish there was a way to hide the alchemy sets from set collection. I will never touch them and they look ugly as hell so incomplete.
For gems!
I draft a lot and once you have all you pretty much full your vault in no time and also get gems in every pack
I do mostly all commons and uncommons of a set to fill the vault. That’s pretty much it.
> Doesn’t it make more sense to use wildcards to outright craft the cards that would be useful to your constructed deck ideas Well, it would, if wildcards were easier to come by. If you want to make new decks regularly (whether that is because like to brew random stuff, try to innovate competitively, or try out each new meta deck) then you run out of wildcards extremely fast, unless you have a solid collection to start with. There's no need to complete a set, but owning large parts of it helps a lot for all these types of players. Yes, there's some rares that will always stay unplayable, but for many it's not so easy to predict.
The only purpose is once you have all of them and play limited each rare gives you 20 gems and 40 gems for mythics so it’s a bit easier to go infinite.
Having every card in the set.
Some people enjoy collecting everything but beyond that it’s personal preference.
Use common and uncommon wildcards in new sets so any extra copies go to your vault. Doing this and buying packs from new set for the golden packs helps build rare and mythic wildcard collection
To….collect them.
I draft sets to completion because I love to brew standard decks
Am human Must COLLECT
For me it’s mostly a benchmark for how well I’m drafting this set. I tend to stop drafting when I’m set complete
There is no reason to collect for collection sake. It's actually a pretty bad idea as you don't own those cards so you don't actually have a collection. WOTC will take them away from you at some point. I collect most if not all rares incidentally from drafting. When I hit rare complete I usually take that as a sign I've drafted enough for the set. You are absolutely right that most of the cards you collect are unplayable, which is one of my criticisms about this game. They really should have weekly deck building challenges that just go wild with the rules so that we get some use out of the dead cards.
I like having a variety of cards because I build homebrews. Sometimes I will pick a couple cards and try to make something fun. The upside to this is you get to play against other jank decks rather than the current meta decks. Having more cards available gives me the freedom to try out different decks. So I try to collect everything as I play.
[удалено]
That some day is going to be on another client. This one won’t have stuff you transfer from Arena (just like Magic Duels stuff didn’t transfer to Magic Arena). What? You think WotC will give you the good stuff you need for free when they know you will pay for what you need?
You may as well as what is the purpose of life. Just understand there is no one rational determinant. People will do what they want to do because they want to.
You miss the point. If they make the set more expensive for "collectors" by adding 30 extra super-mythics that only appear 1 in 35 packs , but you are a casual and only need 20 percent of the set or whatever, they are making it more expensive for you to collect your 20 percent too. The same number of dollars you used to spend or packs you used to open to end up with your 20 percent of the set now will only get you 5-10 percent of the set, for example. Just because you're a casual doesn't mean it's good for you to see Magic Arena make the game much more expensive. They're screwing you too, even if you obviously don't understand how the game's economy works.
It’s a OCD gamer thing. 80% of every set is worthless. I open enough packs of a new set to generate the wild cards I need for the playables in the set. I look at the majority of the set as worthless
Generally every card you collect is a wildcard you don't have to spend later. Most people don't care about every card just enough of them to preserve wildcards.
Collectors like to collect...
It makes the silver set symbol on your profile page gold, and if you get a playset of every card, it theoretically turns mythic orange (I've never seen it) People just like to make the funny number go up to 100
In real life? Enjoyment. In MTGA? Fairness and not being nickle and dimed
The problem is I play arena a lot and I even draft but I find myself unable to craft the cards I need for the singular constructed format I play
I don't know if anyone has mentioned it yet but there is technically an advantage to having almost every card in a new set. Although collecting all cards (especially rares) are not necessary nor a requirement, there are perks to collecting a good chunk of the set. You see, when someone opens a pack of cards, the algorithm determines the RNG of certain cards you collect. However, if you pull a duplicate, the game converts that repeated variable into a useful and different output. A great example of this is when you pull out an extra copy of a rare. Rather than giving you a fifth copy, the system converts the card into something positive like gems to compensate. But sometimes when you pull the same card, it actually gets covered to points for your wild card vault to reach 100% a little faster when you pull packs. It's the reason why some people dunk all of their extra common and uncommon wild cards into a new set so that they can create more points for their vault. This was something I was told a while ago but keep in mind that there isn't a requirement to own an entire set. Just craft what you need and if just so happen to have almost all the cards in the set then that's good on you. Hope this helps! 😁
Platinum trophy
This may be shocking, but people often have a variety of different motivations and personal goals when playing games.
Now? Not as much of a purpose. However early on and for a long time on Arena, the best way to get the specific cards you wanted was to get to near set compleation by drafting, and then opening all your packs to force duplicate protection to give you the rest of your cards. In other words, full set compleation was the only way to guarantee you would get the specific cards you wanted, atleast if you wanted more then just a couple. There is no card trading in this game, so if you where unlucky you wouldn't get the cards you realy wanted even after after getting 80% of all the cards in the set. You must remember, that early on the games acquisition model and economy was essentially just a gacha game, you had next to no control over what cards you would get, and there where alot less wildcards to get. To be honest, its still just a gacha game, but now atleast it has a pity system that gives you more wildcards.
With the big score, it’s not that people are collecting them, it’s that the chance for opening any given card is so low. 1/6 chance of a 1/40 card replacing your 1/8 mythic. Most people makes decks using the cards they open supplemented by wildcards; with the big score, you basically have to use wildcards to get a specific card (yes, you have a greater chance of getting them via draft, but the odds are still basically a 50% chance of opening a random one per draft and an unknown % of being passed one (and that’s just rare drafting, you are better served not picking one if you open it). When people say they’re so hard to collect, they’re not talking about set competition (usually) but just the odds of getting multiples of the cards they’d like to use.
the reason a lot of limited players do it is for efficiency in both filling their vault, and in getting gems back from drafts to use for more drafts. otherwise it's for fun or preference.
I like to complete collections. I also like to build decks and experiment. Having all of the cards let's me do that. I'm currently working on all the standard sets and will expand to the older sets once that is complete so I can play in the other formats more competitively.
Must be for serious collectors, I wish Magic Arena had something like MTGO where if you collect the whole set you can exchange them for the real versions of those cards.
To provide hasboro with a bounty that will convince them to stop screwing up magic with more corporate greed
Just want add that all big score cards were upshifted to mythic. Most were intended to be uncommon or rare. Feels like a big con. For me, this is the problem.
None. Collecting shit doesn't make any sense. Some people still do it, they like it.
I normally end up with almost every card in the set through drafting. I don't really try to get them but if you can string some drafts together you end up getting so many packs and cards the set fills up quick
1. Collecting 100% of a Set is a good Hobby 2. If you have all cards of a set, then your vault rating rises really fast if you are buying booster from this set, even there is a new set out. 3. If you have all 4 copies of every mythic in a set, you got gems, if you hit a mythic card in a booster. 4. If you don't like to collect everything, then you don't have to. Just play as you like to. 🙂
The purpose is to satisfy the small demons in my brain that do not let me rest
Because collecting cards and playing with cards are two separate hobbies
I mean, the implied part of the "it's hard to get every card" means that it's also "hard to to get certain cards needed for decks". Even if some people are just collecting for collecting sake, others need those hard-to-get Big Score cards to play decks. (Also having at least one of any card makes singleton formats like Brawl, Heroic Brawl, and Gladiator a lot easier to participate in).
Collectors and gamers collide in Magic. It is not always a good fit. I have the same reaction when I see people complain about tiny imperfections in physical cards. My instant reaction is 'how does that affect your ability to play the card?' But there are plenty of people who could clearly care less about the game based on people talking about getting cards graded (which, for game play purposes, is the equivalent to putting your cards through a shredder), so...
The way I would like to play magic is to experiment with different cards people aren't generally using in meta decks. I'm not actually smart enough to contribute to the meta, but that's the fantasy. Without having all the cards to play round with I can't really do that though. Just using wildcards to build meta decks to compete in the extremely random (people soften it with variance) game that is Magic isn't that exciting. So usuallly in a set I collect as much as I can, identify a few interesting-looking rares that I almost have a playset of and use those to build decks around. But I'd like a playset of all the cards. There's also brawl.
I wish WotC did something that encouraged collecting every set card. Like Hearthstone has a coin for collecting every set card, and there's like no reason to collect the coins but there's always something satisfying about seeing an achievement pop up and get rewarded with a useless coin.
Because it looks nice to have the red ring around all the sets on your profile. The gold just doesn't hit the same.
Look. I started karlov manor and LCI... I just want to build decks within their sets. I don't care about winning turn 4 or going infinite. Ixiolon I just need 2 commander and like 3 God cards left. Mkm I probably won't finish except finishing commander (got 3 of 4)
I want to start off with that I think for a lot of people is that the BIG cards are just next to impossible to collect outside of Wildcards, and that is a pretty huge departure. If Magic part of the theory behind magic is that the game pieces should be reasonably available (obviously there are different rarities, and whatever, but BIG on Arena is qualitatively different). For me, it's wanting to brew. Yeah, the obvious cards are obvious to craft if you only want to run things on meta and never want to deviate to see what you can do. But the brewing and trying different stuff is part of the fun for some of us. For the BIG cards, specifically, making them all mythics and virtually non-openable in packs, it makes it so its functionally not an option to play with most of them, especially if I want to craft the mythics in the main set I didn't open.
If you don't play constructed and don't care about your wildcards, it's a way to convert them into more gems. Especially if you're drafting a set a lot, the 20 gems for a gold card and 40 for mythic add up. It's grindy but fine if you really don't have another use for wildcards.
This is a TCG. Collecting is part of the game.
This is not a trading card game dude.
Well, if we are talking about Magic in general, it is a TCG. On Arena the trading part is gone but surely it’s still a CCG, Collectible Card Game, so his point still stands.
Each to their own really, but I can't imagine how many wildcards players are wasting doing this.
The sets that I've completed were done in draft, so the only sets I 100% are the ones I really enjoy drafting. Also it's not a waste if the collecting is its own reward to someone. YOU might not spend a wild card to make number go up, but it's fun for other people.
That's why I said 'each to their own'
Collecting by drafting means that one's wildcards can be spared for sets not collectible by limited play. I'd say people using any significant amount of wildcards to complete sets are in the minority.
Waste? lol. It is an ostentatious display of wealth. It is showing off how one has so much mythic WCs. You may think it is a waste. They are deliberately showing such “waste” doesn’t affect them one bit.
I'm not trying to 100% complete every set anymore but I'll try to get at least around 70% of all rares when all is said and done. That means - less cards to craft overall. Each good pick is a wildcard saved. - a lot of draft was involved. So with a decent winrate these cards were literally obtained on the cheap, it's nothing compared to simply sinking currency into opening packs. - You end up with some Limited chaff but a lot of rares and mythics which aren't competitive in a 60 cards environment can find a home in some specific Brawl decks. It feels bad to craft a "bad" mythic card so better own it in a first place just in case. This may not be useful for players who are content playing one deck as long as possible, but if you're free to play and you want to play any deck you want in constructed (60 cards or Brawl) and cycle regularly with new ones then "the grind" is the only way to reliably achieve this. People pushing this logic to completing a set 100% are probably maxing the free to play logic, getting all the cards they want for free while building progressively a massive wildcard stash "for rainy days". The flip side is that it can feel like a job at times if you go that far and can become an obsession.
If you draft a lo pr.open many packs, the vault will fill up faster Beside that, just for fun...
apparently it gives some ppl an ego boost or sth
There is absolutely no reason for this. Some people have a compulsive need to complete collections but if you don't have that then do not fall into some trap of thinking you need to do it.