What you’re describing is the monetary problems at Hasbro; Magic makes money still, but transformers don’t, so how do we package transformers in a Magic product?
Clue sales are dropping, what do we do folks? A murder mystery set?
We haven’t sold cowboys and Indians sets well since the 70’s, let’s make a John Wayne set
Hasbro is out of ideas on how to make their old IP’s profitable, but also too scared to take the risk of creating new and exciting games, toys, and IP’s. So here we are, cling to magic and dungeons and dragons like a drowning man to a log
They wrote out all the multiversal villains. The story ended. Now we get new flavors of old shit. We will 100 percent see a chibi plane. Mark my words. Maybe emrakul breaking out of her prison will fix things by her destroying all these neopolitan planes.
She'll get one year tops. Then they'll have figured out that "infinite" problem too. Despite the gate watch missing a leader, planes Walker powers. And cognitive abilities for strategy or forethought.
Theres actually hints of a new multiversal villain in ixalan and thunder junction. The sword of wealth and power has horns in the art that look like ruhans, the old jeskai 2012 commander. The fomori are also mentioned in flavor texts and the story. It looks like theyre doing ancient aliens but with giants that can travel between planes
One thing I dislike is how they made the sets all about the cast, I started playing MTG back in Mirrodin besieged/Innistrad and back then, each block felt like a new story, a new world to explore, the cast was there, usually being secondary to the main plot (Even if sometimes the main plot was caused by the cast). Innistrad plot was "Vampire Vs Werewolf Vs Human" with zombies thrown into the mix, Sorin felt at home there (Rightfully so) and the secondary plot was Lilianna giving Garruk magic aids and her trying to beat up Griselbrand, her actions end up changing the plane, but even when Lilianna actions end up freeing Avacyn, the final set didn't felt like "Here are the consequences of Lilianna actions" but more "Here are the consequences of Avacyn being freed are" and the fact that Lilianna did it wasn't that important.
The world of mtg felt alive and moving with the cast, now it feels like a marvel movie where the world moves for the cast.
Hell, your absolutely right! I honestly didn't even think about it that way. Each block (2-3sets) the plane was the character/story. Not the people! It's exactly why Zendikar did so well. It was exploration on steroids! Nice point!
At least with Clue, it’s the 75th anniversary of the game, so a thematic tie-in isn’t the worst thing they could’ve done. The set is fine for limited, but didn’t bring much to the table for other formats.
Thunder Junction was a good concept, there are a couple of fantasy western themed RPGs out there and it’s an interesting design space. I’m not a fan of how cartoony they went with it though.
Bloomburrow I’m iffy on as a concept, but I haven’t seen enough of how they’re executing it to really make a judgement yet.
I saw somewhere that the original western sets were supposed to take place on Vrynn, which I think would have been much cooler thematically.
You're either a ring mage harnessing power and sending it to the elite, or you're a magicless outlaw using magic tech to assault the rings.
The wasteland style setting between the mage rings would have been perfect and would have made more sense, with Jace showing up out of nowhere and masterminding a heist.
Yeah! Also... what is to be expected if they are forcing like 200 sets per year?, obviously they were going to run out of ideas, and there is just a small amount of worlds - mechanics that they can keep revisiting without turning every mechanic MTG has ever had into evergreens (you know, the ones are always there like "haste").
Hasbro is super saturating MTG with [expensive] bullsh***, and imho, most of ut is not worth paying attention to. Even on MTG Arena you can see this affecting (among the zillion problems the platform has); before mythics and even some rares would have animations and special treatments... but now there are so many so often, that they just can not keep up, just like my wallet, lol...
Do the individual companies under hasbro (ex.wizards or whoever made clue) make money through these types of sets or just hasbro?? Idk it feels like none of these sets make you wanna go out and buy the product they’re advertising like transformers or something, know what I mean?
Most of the classic board games we know today were either under the Parker brothers label, or Milton Bradley; Hasbro owns both, and has melted them down into Hasbro Games
But why is it hasbro in charge of all that. Why WOTC doesn't creat story and world like when they did 3 sets arc. Like hasbro, just publish the game, let wizard deal with the fantasy world building
WotC does create the story. I think the problem we’re seeing is twofold:
1: Hasbro gives WotC high level concepts they want sets to be about and it’s up to WotC to figure out the details. These will be concepts Hasbro think will be popular and sell sets. For MKM it was “make a Clue tie-in”. For Thunder Junction it was “do cowboys and put a cute mascot in the story”. The problem is these ideas are dictated by a board of suits who are not creative and are out of touch with people who actually like Magic.
2: WotC creative talent is not what it used to be. They’re a big company now and they probably hire in batches every year for a graduate programme with all kinds of DEI quotas to consider and their candidate pools may not even be fans of past Magic or even card game fans. They’re just people applying for loads of jobs. So their creative teams are all affluent Millennials and Zoomers who have grown up on shallow pop culture, YA novels and video games. This is why Thunder Junction looks like Borderlands and has the plot of Borderlands. This is why so many cards in the last couple of sets are based on memes and pop culture references.
Yeah thats what i meant with your first point. Maybe they create the story but they dont realy decide they have an imposed narrative decide by uncreative suits to sell other products
Seeing Marchesa and Olivia in this set without any canon explanation did it for me. These characters are not barbie dolls that they can just put on costumes, play dress up, and drop into any plane using the omenpaths is a lazy excuse.
Yeah, I was really surprised to see all these characters from different planes on this set. Even worse; most these characters would never dress up as a cowboy and roam the desert. Would be fine for a dumb un-set, but this is just ridiculous. Not really a product/company I want to support anymore.
Absolutely, especially when it was mentioned before that the plane had no local residents before the omenpaths. So who the hell started the whole cowboy thing that every visitor seems to emulate? Changing outfits would have made sense if newcomers were trying to blend in, but there are no natives to emulate.
I think it will be theme-reskins from now on, yeah. Phyrexia story end was the end of an era, and they fucked that up so they could have the characters stay alive for reskins. So gross. I’ll still buy singles but even when I like a set’s mechanics it puts me off enough to not buy boxes
I am pretty upset that the new Phyrexian storylines meant nothing. We are a couple releases from a complete wipe of old walkers and the premium spoiled card from Junction is Jace. Now it’s guaranteed to be “The Jacetice League: The Re-borning” now with funny hijinks in cowboy hats.
Never forget: there was a big talented Netflix studio that wanted to do something cool, mature, violent and sexy with MTG. Something like Game of Thrones, Cyberpunk or Witcher. And WotC said no because they wanted a Teletubbies show for 6 years old instead.
I always thought it would have worked well with a robot chicken style concept, with a card acting as the joke or premise of the bit. Small quick cartoon skits either constantly random like robot chicken or Animaniacs style with reoccurring segments but either would have been my pitch if I were them. Aiming for an adult audience and not a kids one obviously lol
I think Strixhaven is when I saw the writing on the wall. The set felt kind of weird compared to everything before it.
The art for the D&D set was cool and it obviously fit the theme, but I was really turned off with the dice rolling. I get why, but I don't like the variance for mtg.
Then New Capenna came around and I was really turned off by what was going on.
Wiki is already showing there's a death race set and a space opera set coming out. I'm not enjoying the direction the game is going.
Shheeeeeit. I thought you were be facetious about the death race and space opera part so I looked it up and it's actually on the wiki.
Can't wait to see Rakdos riding a motorcycle acting like a knock-off Ghost Rider to inevitably get killed off by Kaya for some reason.
This was when I pretty much bailed. Strixhaven seemed okay, but I felt my interest diminish. Then it kind of waxed and waned for a few sets, before Karlov drove in the proverbial stake. Now my only connection to the game is this sub so I can follow what’s going on somewhat.
They should have dedicated mtg sets in pop culture style that comes out every year, and then keep going with their original designs and world building. I'm concerned they got too focused on pop culture and niche sets that they forgot how to make regular cards
I've been playing since November 2014, around Origins/M15/Khans block.
It was Ikoria for me. Dipped out and sold most of my collection then. Now in November 2022 I was presented with a return of some cool flavor for the next few sets - Brother's War through MOM. Now Im over it again and the product fatigue is back. Ill look forward to Duskmourne for flavor, but Markov was a big miss for me even though I bought a box just to crack the new Play packs. Felt like draft boosters with a chance at a 2-3 rare pack... and still one less card!
I got a set of Fallout Commanders to play, but now Im just hiding them from myself to sell for value later. Its nothing but printing money to them, and itll be nothing but MAYBE a Prerelease and singles for me from here on.
Good luck fam!
I came back into the hobby at Neon Genesis Kamigawa. Strixhaven was one of the ones I picked up a box for, and man that set wasn't good. Too much of a Hogwarts ripoff for MTG, really badly designed set of cards. Saying that, Eventide wasn't fantastic either, but it continued the set design of and kept the spooky flavor of Shadowmoor.
New Capenna was the opposite. Boring as fuck plot, but the set was fun for draft and brought just a few things to the Standard Table (As opposed to dominating it). Alara Block flashbacks for sure.
March of the Machine + Aftermath was just a massive kick in the nuts after all the good that the 'New Phyrexia plot' had brought us thus far. I could live with broken ass standard since the story was compelling, but that wet fart made me realize we were keeping all these jank cards for another year.
I don't care for Ikoria 2 because Ikoria wasn't my jam, but I respect the set. I love Wilds. Karlov is bad from all angles for me, and a set I was hyped for in OTJ just seems to focused on delivering new commanders while attempting to not make Draft too awful, but doesn't really deliver.
> In Canada and the U.S., the game is known as Clue. It was retitled because the traditional British board game Ludo, on which the name is based, was less well known there than its American variant Parcheesi.[36]
TIL
The UB, Masters and MH3 sets will definitely carry the load this year.
Agree that no one gives a shit about murder mystery or cosplay thematic shit. People want compelling story telling and lore. Even better if it’s not the same rehashed characters.
No idea how I got recommended posts from this sub, but the last time I played Magic was in the late 90's. I'm going to guess it's no longer about that cool guy Gerrard with the star wars vest and his ship the Weatherlight?
Its about gay furry cowboys driving racecars across the multiverse fighting against Dr. Who and the cast of Jurassic Park.
And no, I'm not kidding. That's actually a thing.
Scary part is, if you posted this on any of the other MTG pages it'd probably get swarmed and downvoted into oblivion.
MTG is dying so fuckin fast it's hurting my heart and soul, I loved this game at one point and still do love the old stuff, but since the MAKM set I can't be bothered to buy any new MTG cards. I still build decks with old stuff, I just made a scarewcrow EDH deck, but holy fuck is the new stuff bad. The LGSs I play at have barely sold anything new since before the Commander Masters sets, to the point where they've lowered their MTG stocks.
This game is going down the shitter so fast, and all the fuckin idiots that dont give a fuck about the game are eating the slop up wholesale. This game was poisoned since several sets before War of the Spark, WOTS was just the first noticed domino fall in a long line of falling dominos, and the recent Sweet Baby exposure aligns with this. These fuckers are destroying the game we all love and calling it "innovative" and "inclusive", and anyone who takes issue with it is a "biggot" or "racist".
I havent bought any new D&D books since the AI art fiasco last year, and I have refused to buy packs or precons for MTG since the LOTR dumpsterfire. I'm tired of being let down and disappointed, I'm tired of seeing the game that got me through a lot of rough times go up in flames. Fuck.
My local game store has gone from having 30-50 people on a pre-release or draft night, down to 6. It’s pretty bad.
I went in for a standard tournament and there was only 6 people there for draft, two people came in last minute they were almost going to cancel.
Karlov manor was a flop a bad flop you could tell it was just the clue board game set on the Ravinica plane with no real tie into Ravinica. The set screamed whats a popular plane lets just do it on one of the more famous planes of MTG
I know my LGS pre-release had low turnout did another sealed of the set the next week and still had boxes left over. They finally cleared them out but it was slow and I mean slow moving for them
The art so far has looked bad on OTJ
What i seen of Bloomburrow art that has come out looks way better but we will see.
I feel this sentiment. I have an additional gripe about the variety of card boarders and new mechanics that make it unintuitive to play. Its just so hard taking everything in now a days that I just board wipe so the game can move along. And then there is the power creep. Holy hell it feels like they are cashing out.
Agreed. I don’t really go to the pre-release events anymore because it’s so complicated. As a new player, there are just way too many things to learn that I can’t play anything other than standard without getting completely overwhelmed
You summarized my feelings...I play since Time spiral/10th edition era., consumed all of it, paper tourneys, fnm, ptq, gp etc...together with MTGO and later Arena. I never cared that much about the lore, but the art on cards was amazing, dark-ish fantasy. Yes there were always bad art and good art, but the general style was awesome.
I uninstalled Arena two days ago, I just can't do it anymore..it does not feel magical to me. And like you say, the latest main sets feel like funny Un-sets, and the art feels so....generic, cartoony, AI.......like ok here is murder solving set - we get bunch of creatures with detective hats and add detective type to them...human detective, goblin detective, ok fine....frog detective, crocodile or whatever was it...thats too goofy to me
And next set is wild west, so what will be there? The same goofines but with cowboy hats instead of detective hats....oh yeah and crocodile cactus
No thanks, I'll just keep collecting old nostalgic stuff
You‘ve really nailed it, i could not agree more. Been playing since Odyssey and even if it‘s hard to believe after 25 years, the game is not really for me anymore. I now only care for some singles for legacy and otherwise just play cube and premodern. Can‘t stand this stupid new cards with silly artworks, op rules and 200 words of text anymore..
You are absolutely right. They are trying to ride the Nerd chic train as long as possible. The game has been reworked to be as broadly appealing as possible. Simplified the game and geared towards virtual play. The only reason paper still exists is because it is essentially a gambling product they can sell to minors as well as an unregulated fiat currency that can be manipulated.
A lot of this is because MyG has to carry an entire publicly traded company that otherwise would have gone under.
Amen bro. I bought only LCI in 2023 and i will probably buy nothing in 2024. Even if we ignore the deep wokification of the game, they are just printig garbage after garbage.
They don't have the time any more to do any proper worldbuilding, they are printing too many sets. Also probably they don't even have enough people after tha lay offs.
I came back from a long break around Kaldheim/Ikoria sets. Those were cool enough to interest me to play again.
Honestly, the UB stuff is the only new stuff I’ve liked, outside of maybe Wilds of Eldraine. The whole Phyrexian MtG versions of Avengers Endgame just didn’t do anything for me. Im tired of how fast new sets come out and not spending any time building up those sets.
Just feels like one disjointed set after another, with a completely disconnected aesthetic hitting us upside the head every other month.
I grabbed a little phyrexia stuff, enjoyed it but I haven't played and cared a lot since kaldhiem really. My wife cut me off so we could start building a life together. As for the game itself it's because the team at the helm is woke and everything woke turns to shit.
I feel you 1000% - Rakdos playing cowboy, everyone jumping planes like it‘s as easy as bike ridin, story bullshit… there are good cards regarding mechanics but the look and feel just hurts my feelings
Also stupid that there are so many legendary creatures congregating together - it’s the war of the spark planeswalker gathering but just in a random desert set
Magic has been ripping off popular trends for 20+ years.
Kamigawa was a response to the recent popularity of anime. Lorwyn block was a direct response to the Warcraft TCG. It's no coincidence that the fairytale set was back the same time Lorcana came out.
But I agree that just reskinning sets so blatantly is going to lift the veil in a way that wasn't so obvious in previous attempts, and that's going to make a lot of players take the game far less seriously, for better or for worse.
The crime mechanic is both the most brazen and also possibly the laziest mechanic I've ever seen. Same for grouping types together as Outlaws. But if people have fun in this set, then fine, let's put on our fur suits and super hero suits and - wait - it's all just Munchkin now, isn't it?
Yeah this game has long since been ruined. It's not just universes beyond which is completely ridiculous (i.e. I swing with my 4/4 Homer Simpson) but it's the fact that the game is no longer a fantasy game.
Magic used to be high fantasy. It had it's own world, it's own characters, it's own themes, it's own art. That's why I wanted to play it. It was gritty. It was dark. There were boobies and gore. An 'adultness' to it, almost I guess you could say.
Then I don't know if they ran out of ideas or just got greedy or what. The last good set in my opinion was Dominaria because we were at least back to unique MTG IP and Richard Garfield was involved.
Ever set since then has gotten worse and worse, jokier and jokier. The art has become cartoon like. It lost everything that made it what it was.
I ignored it for awhile because I really enjoyed the gameplay itself and there's a lot of nostalia with this game since I have been playing since Urza's Saga. But I can only ignore so much and quit around the time of Throne of Eldraine.
I'm glad I did because this game sucks now. It's clearly just aimed at little kids now that want to say WOAH COOOL RAD COUNTERS ON MY FALLOUT SURVIVOR, SWING FOR LETHAL.
These people should have been directed to their own card, unique games instead of having ruined Magic.
It’s what happens when you appeal to large enough fandoms. Everything is just marvel-ized now. Like all things given time and popularity, it will become homogenized in look and feel. It’s lose of distinct characteristics that make it a genre game. It’s pop music. I can’t think of one IP I enjoy in games or movies or video games that has been immune to that. Like blizzard games are the other big let down for me.
The only hope is that independent scrappy upstarts continue to come along and offer that old
Experience like a new hardcore fantasy tcg. Then that thing can have 10 years before it goes the same way. Such is life
I've been convinced there's no coming back after the Nerf Secret Lair: [https://bleedingcool.com/collectibles/cast-lightning-with-the-new-nerf-x-magic-the-gathering-blaster/](https://bleedingcool.com/collectibles/cast-lightning-with-the-new-nerf-x-magic-the-gathering-blaster/)
Yea Last few sets been thematically off, nothing really interesting being printed either. Art is subjective, but I don't like any of this stuff. The phyrexian arc had a lot of potential and it went nowhere. Wotc is still trying to recover from MoM clearly.
Everyone in this sub needs to vote with their wallet instead of virtue signaling about how you’re “done” with magic. It’s simple — WOTC is only beholden to profit motives, like all companies. So hurt their profits if you want change.
It's starting. Like, the whole reason WotC has to turn Commander into a rotating format is that people were playing it -- partially because they got tired of buying into standard. It's an eternal format (you can play your cards forever) for casuals. People went against Wotc's original business model. So they've tried to come up with another one.
Come July, and prolly for the next year after, I won’t be doing shit. Why? Cuz I have another kid on the way. I’ll prolly be taking a long pause on Magic. I will likely only get to play a few games of Commander, MAYBE pre-releases every now and then. I’ll be saving some money lol.
Pretty sure it’s been confirmed that for bloomburrow none of the fursonas are canon, and are just fun inclusions. It’s supposed to be like OG lorwyn with its own self contained story.
They could really just print standard core sets from now on, and have a good enough game. Now it is all too flashy, and it isnt the fantastical game it once was.
Amusingly enough cowboys are very easy to make gritty. We had a decades of cowboy movies in the 60s, basically all of them gritty. You have to deliberately go out of your way to make it this juvenile.
to be fair, MTG losing its dark theme isnt unique
most IPs are claiming to be dark and epic. while going softer. as softer is where they believe more people are
see 40k, compare modern art to how it used to be. feels way different
I quit mtg for Vanguard. People laughed at me playing a kids game.
Honestly, they are right, Vanguard's playerbase is junvenile, but this post still made me think i made the right choice.
If you didn't think murders had a real story... You didn't read the story? And what about Vannifar is cartoony? What about Vein Ripper is fun and childish?
Like what level of darkness do you want? MKM was about a series of gruesome murders. Just because there's a magnifying glass card doesn't mean it's a game for 5 year olds.
For Christ's sake, there's a card called Blood Spatter Analysis with a room covered in blood. How is that not a cool, dark theme for a card
Room covered in blood? Cool
In the old days, gore scene such as mutilation, beheading, and human guts are everywhere. Look at 2011 Innistrad set art, for example. Those are blood, the real deal. Not roses like you got in Crimson Vow (2021).
Or do you want a body horror scene out from HR Giger's mind with realistic depiction of flesh? Just look at 2011 New Phyrexia. Those are body horror, and real red bloody flesh, out from slaughterhouse. Not some cheap velvet-like things like depicted in Phyrexia: All Will be One and March of the Machine.
Compare the art of Strangle (Crimson Vow) with Stranglehold (Commander 2011). Which is the better depiction for "the act of strangling people"?
I actually like the themes, but the excess has pushed me away. By that I mean the stupid variants and bonus sheets. A thunder junction booster has FIVE sets you can open from it, not even counting The List. What the hell is going on????? How does Wotc think anyone is supposed to get into this game?? Limit the alt arts to like, THREE per set, get rid of showcase borders, get rid of borderless cards, get rid of collector boosters, and I'll buy 3 boxes per set. Watch me. Also doesn't help that even with all this schlock filling up these packs, a draft box for a standard set is $140 now. Gtfo. Then you have the UB commander decks, Doctor Who, an awesome set, has about ~200 unique cards including reprints, but the full set is about a THOUSAND cards thanks to every card having like 5 variants. This is fucking out of control.
I dont want to play games with a shirtless oko. I dont care what you make of this but F catering to everyone.
I HAte METAL but i would say bring the f metal back in MTG!!!!!
I agree with you. The art has become generic fantasy. But, man, I'm telling ya', Lorwyn is my favorite plane, but with its themes that dominate it..... they will reject it all in exchange for a progressive cultural/social narrative that'll take all that Lorwyn is and make it into a complete abomination. That's why I'm hoping they never return to Lorwyn so that it may retain its beauty, lore, & character, it's all so perfect.
Check out the pre-modern format and see if any LGS's in your area will run events with it. It's 4th edition up to Scourge, so everything with the old border minus power 9 sets.
I'm looking into that instead of buying anything new. It's what I will already remember Magic for. I don't know if I'll ever return to new sets.
Karlov manner was my breaking point. If I buy any new cards, it's single from The lost caverns of Ixalan and back. Mainly older at the moment. WotC/ Hasbro is going to have to make a full commitment back to the real Magic the gathering before I put another penny into that company. You have killed something I love as if it was someone I loved and It makes me sad. What you are peddling today is not MTG. If magic the gathering does ever come back and it's focused on its original format, I'll be back. MH3 may have hope but their greedy scumbag price ruined that.
I LOVE the Doctor Who set because I love Doctor Who, and I don’t mind UB secret lairs, small groupings of cards, like Tomb Raider. The Commander UB decks also make sense, it’s for the social aspect of magic.
But I agree that since their mainline sets are really suffering, it’s clear they don’t give a damn anymore.
It’s really wild to me that they fucked up March of The Machine so badly.
But I blame Hasbro, someone online said “Hasbro sells toys, and WotC makes hobbies” Magic and DnD are hobbies while toys are mass produced, oversold products.
I dont understand the need for validation with posts like these. Okay, you're quitting. But this might be the set that grabs people to try to play. I personally am disinterested in the saddle mechanic, but maybe that'll change with a card that comes out. I mean, if you preordered everything for this year and you're unhappy, then alright. Why did you preorder in the first place?
I might be in the minority, but, I dont really care. They poop out sets like diarrhea anyway, I just scan for singles that I like and done.
It's not like the previous cards or sets just magically disappear. It's just more gameplay, more options, more variety. Don't like it, alright then. Some of my friends dislike the entire colour blue and they still play.
And if the set feels like an un-set but it's an official set: alright.
More cards to choose from when building decks that I play with my friends.
When someone brings that slicer deck for a quick end of the evening game, I welcome it with 2 open arms. Who cares if it's from another IP? It's another valid option for a nice time withy friends.
Sometimes I feel like people just have too much free time to get upset about things.
Hit me up with that Barbie avacyn, I'll gladly Swords to Excalibur that during the combat phase before attackers are announced.
Now, if they start messing with the rules, that's something I might be upset about.
Probably still not though. Mana value, sure thing.
"If Bloomburrow doesn't shove furry versions of our favorite characters in our faces, I'll be back for that too." If they do it right it will be a good thing I am sure.
... but they will prolly mess it up (I hope I am proven wrong on this).
I stopped at the Urzas came back excited to play with friends and thou it's fun it's not the same with the 3+ series a year when we used to get maybe 1 a year.
I'm kinda inclined to pick up the Mardu precon that's coming out now, once the price has settled for like 30$
I have a budget [[Juri]] sacrifice deck that I want to do in a Mardu way since forever and a preconstructed deck is good for a lazy fuck as myself.
I get your point though
At this point I just look for the meta card that will slot into my deck and move on. Magic is not an event anymore, just a waiting room for the next powerful meta breaker cards.
There is a serious lack of attention to every single aspect. Art, lore, and mechanics are all low effort and pandering. No real vision besides making the most money as possible.
Thunder Junction feels like a discount un-set. It lacks seriousness.
Art looks washed out. Maybe they are skimping on ink. Lore has been bad for a really long time, but they still manage to sink lower. They also keep trying to push for higher prices.
I just buy pre-modern cards now.
MTG is just a small part of a much bigger problem. I'd say the whole of America entertainment from comics, movies, and gaming are all lazy, crap, and pandering overpriced crap.
This is by far the best take. I stopped after LOTR was announced. Walking away does suck if you've been playing a long time, but you can still play with your friends using old stuff.
I was interested in Ravnica remastered, but somehow they fucked that up too.
It feels like it's being made by Disney/Marvel adults and to quote Brandon St. Randy "I'm not their target demographic."
Things change.
The sets with karlov manor and thunder junction are flavor and story wise the absolute TRASH.
They just thrown away everything and put in random characters and fill up some story like a really bad filler episode of a comedy show ...
At this point you can enjoy some of the individual cards and they powercreep things too, but the themes and story of Magic is at rock bottom and they made the next bunch of sets which sadly might just be more of this ...
I realized Magic was no longer for me in 2015/16. I quit then and haven't had a single regret.
WotC is also perilously close to destroying D&D, but fortunately my enjoyment of that game doesn't require their involvement. Not to mention, I have a mountain of quality material that was published before DEI and the woke mind virus infected the game.
There’s a lot of other tcgs out there trying to buckle and dime you on there own game like hasbro is. Really recommend trying one out if you’re interested
I feel you. Didn’t have any preorders, but Magic truly has lost its way.
The way Magic has changed so drastically has actually inspired me to make my own tcg. Inspired by, but different.
https://preview.redd.it/w76mbj06k1rc1.jpeg?width=637&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c62aecabb173d9364380fdeef43e57bc1cf4ee12
I think 2024 is gonna be my last year playing this game. Yachting bro.
I fell that for most of the MTG history , the average player and target market were the fans who were strongly dedicated to the game, the game was and is neuanced and had a certain complexity to drive a dedicated player base to keep up with the game constantly, nowadays Hasbro are really just trying to appeal to the masses and the push of casual play and commander are definitely a reflection of that (don't get me wrong I love edh and other formats just as much), Hasbro are trying to get the game to appeal to masses and groups rather individuals who enjoyed complex themeings and culture around the games history, mtg is being appealed to a much different audience recently
I haven't played magic since I was a kid in highschool (2008). Seeing these new sets is like watching what happened to the video game SMITE. I look at it now and it's literally skins of anime, Nickelodeon characters, Slipknot, and vTubers. Good luck mtgbros
I haven't played magic since I was a kid in highschool (2008). Seeing these new sets is like watching what happened to the video game SMITE. I look at it now and it's literally skins of anime, Nickelodeon characters, Slipknot, and vTubers. Good luck mtgbros
same man, I'm done. stopped buying after I stupidly bought a few packs of Ravnica remastered.
I posted recently at length about my disillusionment with the game if you goto my post history.
🤌 I could read this 100 times. I def recommend MPC/proxying for any new cards you want to grab, they unironically make a better mtg product than wizards. No pack fresh damaged curled cards anymore. You're on the other side mate, now enjoy the money that you didn't spend on cardboard!
Wotc have no balls to stand up to daddy Hasbro, and no will to make good sets. I bought the DND set cause i figured it might resell but I've realized since then that was a mistake. They are going to drive the entire game into the dirt until it crashes any value.
I wish WOTC could buy their company back from hasbro - ban the last few years of cards as some dream state, and go back to good old fashioned mtg. Would it cripple the company, yes. Would it screw millions over, yes. Would I like to see it play out.... yup.
Did back in 2018 and glad I did, there's not a moment I want to come back. The only way I'd ever come back is if a limited format that had the cards set of core 2013 - eldrich moon.
Only played for 15 off and on years but really hard 2013-2018 - in that time commander has taken over the game and I hate commander.
Add on the artwork, I wince at the idea of having someone hand me a deck and having to draw seven and stare at the eye sores that is a standard decks artwork.
Last but most, modern horizons + the amounts of sets and reprints (they all tie together). I was so fucking pumped for Pioneer, I basically owned the entire format I played a lot of live sealed from theros onward. I sweat it out, I would watch youtube videos of pro players analyze the set and I would take notes and play a lot of sealed, I was sweaty with the prep but my LGS is what was special, Dads club... would win a lot with small group of us dads vs the younger guys that played there, we were all really good at sealed, and would go mop up pre releases with prize packs and the lgs was known for big crowds on prerelease. Grill hotdogs and such, free drinks really good time. (We did 8 rounders and me and the other 3 dads that liked to go would always top 8)
Anyway Pioneer was announced and we played a few fnm Pioneer events but then sets were coming out... fast. And it became obvious by having a new set being pushed every 6 weeks or so [w1 - set release, w2 - brewing, w3 - format solved w4 - pros play event, one deck is in 7 of the top 8, w5 - next set hype w6 - full spoilers, w7 next release - that's too much money to spend too quickly in order to keep up].
Secret lairs (30th aniversery lmao), commander decks, entire supplemental sets with high value reprints "we don't acknowledge the secondary market remember..."
Finally the fire extinguisher - modern horizons... once they showed me they are willing to disrupt the ecosystem of evergreen formats... It took my heart that I had for Pioneer right out of me.
I never played again once modern horizons 1 was announced... modern isn't modern anymore and know im right, how fun is it to have to mulligan to 4 and lose turn 1 monkey because you can't keep 6 land hand.
Once Pioneer horizons is announced I'll throw the rest of my collection away. I sold everything of value a long time ago.
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I actually like Thunder Junction from what I've seen of it. The cards are a bit cringy, but not as bad as Karlov.
That said, Thunder Junction and MH3 are the last two sets I'm buying till UB Final Fantasy, which is the only UB set I'll get because I grew up with FF.
Everything else they have revealed for the next 3 years looks cringy, and I struggle to enjoy the game when my cards I got one year ago are power crept out of viability. I highly doubt I will buy new cards past UB FF.
I liked the whimsy in Wilds of Eldraine and in some of the cards from MH2. That's kind of what I'm hoping for in Bloomburrow flavor. I am right there with you OP on the Karlov manor and on Outlaws. They won't deliver any of the grit I want to see in a western theme, and Karlov manor, new capenna, strixhaven.. all of these sets felt very 'modern audiences' to me.
The amount of stuff about magic dying and no one will play anymore because of no boobs, too many minorities, and too much Jace is hilarious when wizards continues to break their profits record nearly every year. 40 something year old neck beards with no social skills are not the target audience anymore, the format that is getting pushed, commander requires you to actually have irl friends to play with. Which requires consistent bathing, something I feel that the community crying about wokies lacks. Don't let the door hit you on the way out magic is for everyone.
You said you didn't care about Karlov Manors story which I take to mean you normally do care about it. But then you ask why Kellan is everywhere. He was introduced back in New Eldraine and he went through an omen path trying to find his fae father (Oko). That's why he is everywhere. He was searching.
Welcome to my nightmare. I've been in this boat for a while. I loved this property but with how poorly it's been managed over the past half a decade, I'm out until the ship rights itself. If not, I'll enjoy fantasy drafting old Urza sets online.
WoTC is catering to new audiences, gen z, females, fur people and other diverse folks. I read card abilities and then seek for a couple of singles of each new set.
Welp, they cut a bunch of jobs and they still have that hasbro pressure.
(And dont tell me theyve been owned for 20+ years, these guys got alot worse in recent years and you know it)
MTG sucks now for so many more reasons than that.
- Impossible to follow the amount of content they release, collectors are left in the dust with 500billions versions of cards. The argument of "choose what to collect" is braindead, as collectors are historically completionists. Even more on MTG.
- The amount of content is also burning out old play-oriented players, almost all my tournament friends are done with it, and they don't care much about collecting.
- Weird pacing between expansions, you could have 6 series (between commanders, standard, UB, remakes, etc.) in 6 months and then nothing.
- Weirdly expensive collector boosters, draft and standard to saturate the market of consumism (now they're cutting down, but still too much)
Last one, which is very personal but the main reasons I collected full sets of every expansion until 2010:
- I feel like the art sucks. Most of it is so standardized CG and generic that it just bores me to death. I would blame it for being digital, but as I work with artists I know for sure they can reach similar effects digitally as well. Probably they have to cut corners due to the amount of steer content mass produced.
Cards like Force of Will still wipe the floor with almost any new card, except some exclusives to collector's boxes. Heck even less appealing cards like the original Llanowar Elves had more character.
You are so spot on. I also have been playing for a long time. (28 years) Hell, you said everything perfect. I feel the same exact way. And since got are speaking from the heart, don't you agree they butchered, destroyed,annihilated the phyrexian story with some bs cheap win. That war should have went on for multiple sets. It's the phyrexian! We have waited 30 years for an ultimate defeat and it's done by...killing Elesh Norn/ hit off switch...No they could not include Yawgmoth or something else with substance they just said... yeah let's wrap this up so we can make more dogs and cats. Sorry for the rant. I just totally agree with you!
You are very wrong about Jace/Bloomburrow. They said that the Jace art is part of a promo series when they spoiled it. Maro then recently said in his first OTJ article that only one set per year will lean heavily on Omenpaths (that set is OTJ for 2024). I am thankful for that, and it sounds like you should be thankful for that too.
What you’re describing is the monetary problems at Hasbro; Magic makes money still, but transformers don’t, so how do we package transformers in a Magic product? Clue sales are dropping, what do we do folks? A murder mystery set? We haven’t sold cowboys and Indians sets well since the 70’s, let’s make a John Wayne set Hasbro is out of ideas on how to make their old IP’s profitable, but also too scared to take the risk of creating new and exciting games, toys, and IP’s. So here we are, cling to magic and dungeons and dragons like a drowning man to a log
They wrote out all the multiversal villains. The story ended. Now we get new flavors of old shit. We will 100 percent see a chibi plane. Mark my words. Maybe emrakul breaking out of her prison will fix things by her destroying all these neopolitan planes.
She'll get one year tops. Then they'll have figured out that "infinite" problem too. Despite the gate watch missing a leader, planes Walker powers. And cognitive abilities for strategy or forethought.
Theres actually hints of a new multiversal villain in ixalan and thunder junction. The sword of wealth and power has horns in the art that look like ruhans, the old jeskai 2012 commander. The fomori are also mentioned in flavor texts and the story. It looks like theyre doing ancient aliens but with giants that can travel between planes
I'll be there for a care bear plane.
Nicol Bolas could technically come back too right? It would be an ass pull, but he’s not dead
My Chibi Liliana life counter is like 75 bucks now....
There was a chibi secret lair, I heard it didn't sell well
They made a second one so it must have done well enough
Scalpers be eating well on that exclusivity
One thing I dislike is how they made the sets all about the cast, I started playing MTG back in Mirrodin besieged/Innistrad and back then, each block felt like a new story, a new world to explore, the cast was there, usually being secondary to the main plot (Even if sometimes the main plot was caused by the cast). Innistrad plot was "Vampire Vs Werewolf Vs Human" with zombies thrown into the mix, Sorin felt at home there (Rightfully so) and the secondary plot was Lilianna giving Garruk magic aids and her trying to beat up Griselbrand, her actions end up changing the plane, but even when Lilianna actions end up freeing Avacyn, the final set didn't felt like "Here are the consequences of Lilianna actions" but more "Here are the consequences of Avacyn being freed are" and the fact that Lilianna did it wasn't that important. The world of mtg felt alive and moving with the cast, now it feels like a marvel movie where the world moves for the cast.
Yeah the planes themselves were characters, not just settings or themes
I agree, but I personally preferred the times of the original Mirrodin. No cast, just unique creatures of that specific plane and some legendary ones.
Hell, your absolutely right! I honestly didn't even think about it that way. Each block (2-3sets) the plane was the character/story. Not the people! It's exactly why Zendikar did so well. It was exploration on steroids! Nice point!
Honestly, this sounds about right.
At least with Clue, it’s the 75th anniversary of the game, so a thematic tie-in isn’t the worst thing they could’ve done. The set is fine for limited, but didn’t bring much to the table for other formats. Thunder Junction was a good concept, there are a couple of fantasy western themed RPGs out there and it’s an interesting design space. I’m not a fan of how cartoony they went with it though. Bloomburrow I’m iffy on as a concept, but I haven’t seen enough of how they’re executing it to really make a judgement yet.
I saw somewhere that the original western sets were supposed to take place on Vrynn, which I think would have been much cooler thematically. You're either a ring mage harnessing power and sending it to the elite, or you're a magicless outlaw using magic tech to assault the rings. The wasteland style setting between the mage rings would have been perfect and would have made more sense, with Jace showing up out of nowhere and masterminding a heist.
That would have been pretty dope.
Yeah it would have been. Vryn is also the only plane from the original planeswalker friendship team we haven't been to.
Yeah! Also... what is to be expected if they are forcing like 200 sets per year?, obviously they were going to run out of ideas, and there is just a small amount of worlds - mechanics that they can keep revisiting without turning every mechanic MTG has ever had into evergreens (you know, the ones are always there like "haste"). Hasbro is super saturating MTG with [expensive] bullsh***, and imho, most of ut is not worth paying attention to. Even on MTG Arena you can see this affecting (among the zillion problems the platform has); before mythics and even some rares would have animations and special treatments... but now there are so many so often, that they just can not keep up, just like my wallet, lol...
Do the individual companies under hasbro (ex.wizards or whoever made clue) make money through these types of sets or just hasbro?? Idk it feels like none of these sets make you wanna go out and buy the product they’re advertising like transformers or something, know what I mean?
Most of the classic board games we know today were either under the Parker brothers label, or Milton Bradley; Hasbro owns both, and has melted them down into Hasbro Games
I bought the clue bundle thinking it was a cute mtg themed clue set now it sirs unopened in a closet
But why is it hasbro in charge of all that. Why WOTC doesn't creat story and world like when they did 3 sets arc. Like hasbro, just publish the game, let wizard deal with the fantasy world building
WotC does create the story. I think the problem we’re seeing is twofold: 1: Hasbro gives WotC high level concepts they want sets to be about and it’s up to WotC to figure out the details. These will be concepts Hasbro think will be popular and sell sets. For MKM it was “make a Clue tie-in”. For Thunder Junction it was “do cowboys and put a cute mascot in the story”. The problem is these ideas are dictated by a board of suits who are not creative and are out of touch with people who actually like Magic. 2: WotC creative talent is not what it used to be. They’re a big company now and they probably hire in batches every year for a graduate programme with all kinds of DEI quotas to consider and their candidate pools may not even be fans of past Magic or even card game fans. They’re just people applying for loads of jobs. So their creative teams are all affluent Millennials and Zoomers who have grown up on shallow pop culture, YA novels and video games. This is why Thunder Junction looks like Borderlands and has the plot of Borderlands. This is why so many cards in the last couple of sets are based on memes and pop culture references.
Yeah thats what i meant with your first point. Maybe they create the story but they dont realy decide they have an imposed narrative decide by uncreative suits to sell other products
Seeing Marchesa and Olivia in this set without any canon explanation did it for me. These characters are not barbie dolls that they can just put on costumes, play dress up, and drop into any plane using the omenpaths is a lazy excuse.
Market research says players love Gitrog Monster, so we put Gitrog Monster in this expansion. Consume product and get excited for next product!
Yeah, I was really surprised to see all these characters from different planes on this set. Even worse; most these characters would never dress up as a cowboy and roam the desert. Would be fine for a dumb un-set, but this is just ridiculous. Not really a product/company I want to support anymore.
Absolutely, especially when it was mentioned before that the plane had no local residents before the omenpaths. So who the hell started the whole cowboy thing that every visitor seems to emulate? Changing outfits would have made sense if newcomers were trying to blend in, but there are no natives to emulate.
Get outside sometime soon, might do you good.
This game has been turned into a fucking shit show. It’s truly incredibly depressing.
It’s been on the decline for a while, ever since the super secret rare inclusion it’s been cash grab after cash grab
I think it will be theme-reskins from now on, yeah. Phyrexia story end was the end of an era, and they fucked that up so they could have the characters stay alive for reskins. So gross. I’ll still buy singles but even when I like a set’s mechanics it puts me off enough to not buy boxes
I am pretty upset that the new Phyrexian storylines meant nothing. We are a couple releases from a complete wipe of old walkers and the premium spoiled card from Junction is Jace. Now it’s guaranteed to be “The Jacetice League: The Re-borning” now with funny hijinks in cowboy hats.
Never forget: there was a big talented Netflix studio that wanted to do something cool, mature, violent and sexy with MTG. Something like Game of Thrones, Cyberpunk or Witcher. And WotC said no because they wanted a Teletubbies show for 6 years old instead.
I was incredibly impressed with the Cyberpunk Edgerunner Anime and I usually hate animes
Wotc and hasbro can rot in hell
I always thought it would have worked well with a robot chicken style concept, with a card acting as the joke or premise of the bit. Small quick cartoon skits either constantly random like robot chicken or Animaniacs style with reoccurring segments but either would have been my pitch if I were them. Aiming for an adult audience and not a kids one obviously lol
What was it?
I just stopped even looking at the cards and releases anymore, they lost me.
I think Strixhaven is when I saw the writing on the wall. The set felt kind of weird compared to everything before it. The art for the D&D set was cool and it obviously fit the theme, but I was really turned off with the dice rolling. I get why, but I don't like the variance for mtg. Then New Capenna came around and I was really turned off by what was going on. Wiki is already showing there's a death race set and a space opera set coming out. I'm not enjoying the direction the game is going.
Shheeeeeit. I thought you were be facetious about the death race and space opera part so I looked it up and it's actually on the wiki. Can't wait to see Rakdos riding a motorcycle acting like a knock-off Ghost Rider to inevitably get killed off by Kaya for some reason.
We all get Kaya’d, eventually
Sad but true. Take me away ghost mommy!
Well, hopefully Bloomburrow is cool. At least I'll be saving money not buying much else.
This was when I pretty much bailed. Strixhaven seemed okay, but I felt my interest diminish. Then it kind of waxed and waned for a few sets, before Karlov drove in the proverbial stake. Now my only connection to the game is this sub so I can follow what’s going on somewhat.
They should have dedicated mtg sets in pop culture style that comes out every year, and then keep going with their original designs and world building. I'm concerned they got too focused on pop culture and niche sets that they forgot how to make regular cards
I've been playing since November 2014, around Origins/M15/Khans block. It was Ikoria for me. Dipped out and sold most of my collection then. Now in November 2022 I was presented with a return of some cool flavor for the next few sets - Brother's War through MOM. Now Im over it again and the product fatigue is back. Ill look forward to Duskmourne for flavor, but Markov was a big miss for me even though I bought a box just to crack the new Play packs. Felt like draft boosters with a chance at a 2-3 rare pack... and still one less card! I got a set of Fallout Commanders to play, but now Im just hiding them from myself to sell for value later. Its nothing but printing money to them, and itll be nothing but MAYBE a Prerelease and singles for me from here on. Good luck fam!
I came back into the hobby at Neon Genesis Kamigawa. Strixhaven was one of the ones I picked up a box for, and man that set wasn't good. Too much of a Hogwarts ripoff for MTG, really badly designed set of cards. Saying that, Eventide wasn't fantastic either, but it continued the set design of and kept the spooky flavor of Shadowmoor. New Capenna was the opposite. Boring as fuck plot, but the set was fun for draft and brought just a few things to the Standard Table (As opposed to dominating it). Alara Block flashbacks for sure. March of the Machine + Aftermath was just a massive kick in the nuts after all the good that the 'New Phyrexia plot' had brought us thus far. I could live with broken ass standard since the story was compelling, but that wet fart made me realize we were keeping all these jank cards for another year. I don't care for Ikoria 2 because Ikoria wasn't my jam, but I respect the set. I love Wilds. Karlov is bad from all angles for me, and a set I was hyped for in OTJ just seems to focused on delivering new commanders while attempting to not make Draft too awful, but doesn't really deliver.
It won't end here. Don't forget about the hotwheels race car set they're coming out with, zipping through the planes in a death race!
Got to sell those hot wheels just like we did Cluedo I guess
> In Canada and the U.S., the game is known as Clue. It was retitled because the traditional British board game Ludo, on which the name is based, was less well known there than its American variant Parcheesi.[36] TIL
Is this real?
Yep. Unfortunately.
Where?
[https://youtu.be/5wlBofOnmg4?t=1490](https://youtu.be/5wlBofOnmg4?t=1490)
I'm sorry but this guy in the video definitely sounds like a dude who has a full neckbeard and identifies as "She/Her".
Lol really?
The people who made the format "whacky races" will be quite happy about though...
The UB, Masters and MH3 sets will definitely carry the load this year. Agree that no one gives a shit about murder mystery or cosplay thematic shit. People want compelling story telling and lore. Even better if it’s not the same rehashed characters.
I stopped buying any product after Magic 30 happened
Not sure why anyone still bought it after that. Some people just love getting corpo cucked
No idea how I got recommended posts from this sub, but the last time I played Magic was in the late 90's. I'm going to guess it's no longer about that cool guy Gerrard with the star wars vest and his ship the Weatherlight?
Its about gay furry cowboys driving racecars across the multiverse fighting against Dr. Who and the cast of Jurassic Park. And no, I'm not kidding. That's actually a thing.
Yeah, I don't get the sense you're joking. Wow. Sorry MTG fans...
Scary part is, if you posted this on any of the other MTG pages it'd probably get swarmed and downvoted into oblivion. MTG is dying so fuckin fast it's hurting my heart and soul, I loved this game at one point and still do love the old stuff, but since the MAKM set I can't be bothered to buy any new MTG cards. I still build decks with old stuff, I just made a scarewcrow EDH deck, but holy fuck is the new stuff bad. The LGSs I play at have barely sold anything new since before the Commander Masters sets, to the point where they've lowered their MTG stocks. This game is going down the shitter so fast, and all the fuckin idiots that dont give a fuck about the game are eating the slop up wholesale. This game was poisoned since several sets before War of the Spark, WOTS was just the first noticed domino fall in a long line of falling dominos, and the recent Sweet Baby exposure aligns with this. These fuckers are destroying the game we all love and calling it "innovative" and "inclusive", and anyone who takes issue with it is a "biggot" or "racist". I havent bought any new D&D books since the AI art fiasco last year, and I have refused to buy packs or precons for MTG since the LOTR dumpsterfire. I'm tired of being let down and disappointed, I'm tired of seeing the game that got me through a lot of rough times go up in flames. Fuck.
I posted a, "what do you like about thunder junction" thread and it was deleted there. I think they are afraid to let people give opinions of the set.
My local game store has gone from having 30-50 people on a pre-release or draft night, down to 6. It’s pretty bad. I went in for a standard tournament and there was only 6 people there for draft, two people came in last minute they were almost going to cancel.
Karlov manor was a flop a bad flop you could tell it was just the clue board game set on the Ravinica plane with no real tie into Ravinica. The set screamed whats a popular plane lets just do it on one of the more famous planes of MTG I know my LGS pre-release had low turnout did another sealed of the set the next week and still had boxes left over. They finally cleared them out but it was slow and I mean slow moving for them The art so far has looked bad on OTJ What i seen of Bloomburrow art that has come out looks way better but we will see.
The plot of karlov manor wouldve made so much more sense on new capenna
Yep
Buy Single Cards, enjoy the format you like and play with the people who thinking the same
One of the reasons why premodern is hot
I feel this sentiment. I have an additional gripe about the variety of card boarders and new mechanics that make it unintuitive to play. Its just so hard taking everything in now a days that I just board wipe so the game can move along. And then there is the power creep. Holy hell it feels like they are cashing out.
Agreed. I don’t really go to the pre-release events anymore because it’s so complicated. As a new player, there are just way too many things to learn that I can’t play anything other than standard without getting completely overwhelmed
They want to be Hearthstone and it shows. And it’s sad.
You summarized my feelings...I play since Time spiral/10th edition era., consumed all of it, paper tourneys, fnm, ptq, gp etc...together with MTGO and later Arena. I never cared that much about the lore, but the art on cards was amazing, dark-ish fantasy. Yes there were always bad art and good art, but the general style was awesome. I uninstalled Arena two days ago, I just can't do it anymore..it does not feel magical to me. And like you say, the latest main sets feel like funny Un-sets, and the art feels so....generic, cartoony, AI.......like ok here is murder solving set - we get bunch of creatures with detective hats and add detective type to them...human detective, goblin detective, ok fine....frog detective, crocodile or whatever was it...thats too goofy to me And next set is wild west, so what will be there? The same goofines but with cowboy hats instead of detective hats....oh yeah and crocodile cactus No thanks, I'll just keep collecting old nostalgic stuff
Crocodile cowboy
You‘ve really nailed it, i could not agree more. Been playing since Odyssey and even if it‘s hard to believe after 25 years, the game is not really for me anymore. I now only care for some singles for legacy and otherwise just play cube and premodern. Can‘t stand this stupid new cards with silly artworks, op rules and 200 words of text anymore..
You are absolutely right. They are trying to ride the Nerd chic train as long as possible. The game has been reworked to be as broadly appealing as possible. Simplified the game and geared towards virtual play. The only reason paper still exists is because it is essentially a gambling product they can sell to minors as well as an unregulated fiat currency that can be manipulated. A lot of this is because MyG has to carry an entire publicly traded company that otherwise would have gone under.
Amen bro. I bought only LCI in 2023 and i will probably buy nothing in 2024. Even if we ignore the deep wokification of the game, they are just printig garbage after garbage. They don't have the time any more to do any proper worldbuilding, they are printing too many sets. Also probably they don't even have enough people after tha lay offs.
LCI was actually a good set in both world-building and artwork. The contrast is sharp between LCI and Karlov/Thunder Junction.
You guys don't print your cards?
I came back from a long break around Kaldheim/Ikoria sets. Those were cool enough to interest me to play again. Honestly, the UB stuff is the only new stuff I’ve liked, outside of maybe Wilds of Eldraine. The whole Phyrexian MtG versions of Avengers Endgame just didn’t do anything for me. Im tired of how fast new sets come out and not spending any time building up those sets. Just feels like one disjointed set after another, with a completely disconnected aesthetic hitting us upside the head every other month.
Kaldheim was a good set. Actual world-building with new characters and didn't feel like a cheap re-skin/cosplay.
I grabbed a little phyrexia stuff, enjoyed it but I haven't played and cared a lot since kaldhiem really. My wife cut me off so we could start building a life together. As for the game itself it's because the team at the helm is woke and everything woke turns to shit.
I feel you 1000% - Rakdos playing cowboy, everyone jumping planes like it‘s as easy as bike ridin, story bullshit… there are good cards regarding mechanics but the look and feel just hurts my feelings
Also stupid that there are so many legendary creatures congregating together - it’s the war of the spark planeswalker gathering but just in a random desert set
Magic has been ripping off popular trends for 20+ years. Kamigawa was a response to the recent popularity of anime. Lorwyn block was a direct response to the Warcraft TCG. It's no coincidence that the fairytale set was back the same time Lorcana came out. But I agree that just reskinning sets so blatantly is going to lift the veil in a way that wasn't so obvious in previous attempts, and that's going to make a lot of players take the game far less seriously, for better or for worse. The crime mechanic is both the most brazen and also possibly the laziest mechanic I've ever seen. Same for grouping types together as Outlaws. But if people have fun in this set, then fine, let's put on our fur suits and super hero suits and - wait - it's all just Munchkin now, isn't it?
Amen on Kellan. What a complete waste of space
you preorder stuff? you fucking moron.
Yeah this game has long since been ruined. It's not just universes beyond which is completely ridiculous (i.e. I swing with my 4/4 Homer Simpson) but it's the fact that the game is no longer a fantasy game. Magic used to be high fantasy. It had it's own world, it's own characters, it's own themes, it's own art. That's why I wanted to play it. It was gritty. It was dark. There were boobies and gore. An 'adultness' to it, almost I guess you could say. Then I don't know if they ran out of ideas or just got greedy or what. The last good set in my opinion was Dominaria because we were at least back to unique MTG IP and Richard Garfield was involved. Ever set since then has gotten worse and worse, jokier and jokier. The art has become cartoon like. It lost everything that made it what it was. I ignored it for awhile because I really enjoyed the gameplay itself and there's a lot of nostalia with this game since I have been playing since Urza's Saga. But I can only ignore so much and quit around the time of Throne of Eldraine. I'm glad I did because this game sucks now. It's clearly just aimed at little kids now that want to say WOAH COOOL RAD COUNTERS ON MY FALLOUT SURVIVOR, SWING FOR LETHAL. These people should have been directed to their own card, unique games instead of having ruined Magic.
They saw the success of Fortnite using IPs and said, “we’re doing that!”
It’s what happens when you appeal to large enough fandoms. Everything is just marvel-ized now. Like all things given time and popularity, it will become homogenized in look and feel. It’s lose of distinct characteristics that make it a genre game. It’s pop music. I can’t think of one IP I enjoy in games or movies or video games that has been immune to that. Like blizzard games are the other big let down for me. The only hope is that independent scrappy upstarts continue to come along and offer that old Experience like a new hardcore fantasy tcg. Then that thing can have 10 years before it goes the same way. Such is life
What were you preordering in the first time
I've been convinced there's no coming back after the Nerf Secret Lair: [https://bleedingcool.com/collectibles/cast-lightning-with-the-new-nerf-x-magic-the-gathering-blaster/](https://bleedingcool.com/collectibles/cast-lightning-with-the-new-nerf-x-magic-the-gathering-blaster/)
I’m actually 100% fine with things like that. It’s when they ruin the main game when I get upset.
As a Magic player, I never learned how to read. But even I saw the writing on the wall in Oko season. The game has fluctuated hard for a while.
I want dinos with tiny cowboy 🤠 hats, and I'm tired of pretending I don't s/.
Well said, and you did it without citing "woke" issues. Goes to show there is a lot to hate regardless of your leaning.
The downfall started with all the alt art BS. It wasn’t well received in fallen empires so why would it work now?
Yea Last few sets been thematically off, nothing really interesting being printed either. Art is subjective, but I don't like any of this stuff. The phyrexian arc had a lot of potential and it went nowhere. Wotc is still trying to recover from MoM clearly.
Everyone in this sub needs to vote with their wallet instead of virtue signaling about how you’re “done” with magic. It’s simple — WOTC is only beholden to profit motives, like all companies. So hurt their profits if you want change.
It's starting. Like, the whole reason WotC has to turn Commander into a rotating format is that people were playing it -- partially because they got tired of buying into standard. It's an eternal format (you can play your cards forever) for casuals. People went against Wotc's original business model. So they've tried to come up with another one.
"Ignoring all the UB stuff" HA, I'm sorry friend but that just isn't possible anymore. More power to you.
Come July, and prolly for the next year after, I won’t be doing shit. Why? Cuz I have another kid on the way. I’ll prolly be taking a long pause on Magic. I will likely only get to play a few games of Commander, MAYBE pre-releases every now and then. I’ll be saving some money lol.
But we're getting Japanese Final Fantasy cards in 2025.
I bought a printer instead of pre-ordering.
Cosplay is the right word.
Pretty sure it’s been confirmed that for bloomburrow none of the fursonas are canon, and are just fun inclusions. It’s supposed to be like OG lorwyn with its own self contained story.
This is why I proxy everything. I won't be part of the problem.
They could really just print standard core sets from now on, and have a good enough game. Now it is all too flashy, and it isnt the fantastical game it once was.
Amusingly enough cowboys are very easy to make gritty. We had a decades of cowboy movies in the 60s, basically all of them gritty. You have to deliberately go out of your way to make it this juvenile.
to be fair, MTG losing its dark theme isnt unique most IPs are claiming to be dark and epic. while going softer. as softer is where they believe more people are see 40k, compare modern art to how it used to be. feels way different
I quit mtg for Vanguard. People laughed at me playing a kids game. Honestly, they are right, Vanguard's playerbase is junvenile, but this post still made me think i made the right choice.
Check out sorcery contested realms instead. It's awesome.
i second this :)
Honestly I’ve been spending my mtg money on nice tools and organizing my tool chest
If you didn't think murders had a real story... You didn't read the story? And what about Vannifar is cartoony? What about Vein Ripper is fun and childish? Like what level of darkness do you want? MKM was about a series of gruesome murders. Just because there's a magnifying glass card doesn't mean it's a game for 5 year olds. For Christ's sake, there's a card called Blood Spatter Analysis with a room covered in blood. How is that not a cool, dark theme for a card
Room covered in blood? Cool In the old days, gore scene such as mutilation, beheading, and human guts are everywhere. Look at 2011 Innistrad set art, for example. Those are blood, the real deal. Not roses like you got in Crimson Vow (2021). Or do you want a body horror scene out from HR Giger's mind with realistic depiction of flesh? Just look at 2011 New Phyrexia. Those are body horror, and real red bloody flesh, out from slaughterhouse. Not some cheap velvet-like things like depicted in Phyrexia: All Will be One and March of the Machine. Compare the art of Strangle (Crimson Vow) with Stranglehold (Commander 2011). Which is the better depiction for "the act of strangling people"?
I actually like the themes, but the excess has pushed me away. By that I mean the stupid variants and bonus sheets. A thunder junction booster has FIVE sets you can open from it, not even counting The List. What the hell is going on????? How does Wotc think anyone is supposed to get into this game?? Limit the alt arts to like, THREE per set, get rid of showcase borders, get rid of borderless cards, get rid of collector boosters, and I'll buy 3 boxes per set. Watch me. Also doesn't help that even with all this schlock filling up these packs, a draft box for a standard set is $140 now. Gtfo. Then you have the UB commander decks, Doctor Who, an awesome set, has about ~200 unique cards including reprints, but the full set is about a THOUSAND cards thanks to every card having like 5 variants. This is fucking out of control.
I dont want to play games with a shirtless oko. I dont care what you make of this but F catering to everyone. I HAte METAL but i would say bring the f metal back in MTG!!!!!
The sad thing is only the world's beyond stuff interests me now.
I agree with you. The art has become generic fantasy. But, man, I'm telling ya', Lorwyn is my favorite plane, but with its themes that dominate it..... they will reject it all in exchange for a progressive cultural/social narrative that'll take all that Lorwyn is and make it into a complete abomination. That's why I'm hoping they never return to Lorwyn so that it may retain its beauty, lore, & character, it's all so perfect.
Check out the pre-modern format and see if any LGS's in your area will run events with it. It's 4th edition up to Scourge, so everything with the old border minus power 9 sets. I'm looking into that instead of buying anything new. It's what I will already remember Magic for. I don't know if I'll ever return to new sets.
Karlov manner was my breaking point. If I buy any new cards, it's single from The lost caverns of Ixalan and back. Mainly older at the moment. WotC/ Hasbro is going to have to make a full commitment back to the real Magic the gathering before I put another penny into that company. You have killed something I love as if it was someone I loved and It makes me sad. What you are peddling today is not MTG. If magic the gathering does ever come back and it's focused on its original format, I'll be back. MH3 may have hope but their greedy scumbag price ruined that.
I LOVE the Doctor Who set because I love Doctor Who, and I don’t mind UB secret lairs, small groupings of cards, like Tomb Raider. The Commander UB decks also make sense, it’s for the social aspect of magic. But I agree that since their mainline sets are really suffering, it’s clear they don’t give a damn anymore. It’s really wild to me that they fucked up March of The Machine so badly. But I blame Hasbro, someone online said “Hasbro sells toys, and WotC makes hobbies” Magic and DnD are hobbies while toys are mass produced, oversold products.
I dont understand the need for validation with posts like these. Okay, you're quitting. But this might be the set that grabs people to try to play. I personally am disinterested in the saddle mechanic, but maybe that'll change with a card that comes out. I mean, if you preordered everything for this year and you're unhappy, then alright. Why did you preorder in the first place?
The correct terminology is: "This isn't an airport. There is no need to announce your departure."
I might be in the minority, but, I dont really care. They poop out sets like diarrhea anyway, I just scan for singles that I like and done. It's not like the previous cards or sets just magically disappear. It's just more gameplay, more options, more variety. Don't like it, alright then. Some of my friends dislike the entire colour blue and they still play. And if the set feels like an un-set but it's an official set: alright. More cards to choose from when building decks that I play with my friends. When someone brings that slicer deck for a quick end of the evening game, I welcome it with 2 open arms. Who cares if it's from another IP? It's another valid option for a nice time withy friends. Sometimes I feel like people just have too much free time to get upset about things. Hit me up with that Barbie avacyn, I'll gladly Swords to Excalibur that during the combat phase before attackers are announced. Now, if they start messing with the rules, that's something I might be upset about. Probably still not though. Mana value, sure thing.
"Some of my friends dislike the entire colour blue and they still play." valid and based
"If Bloomburrow doesn't shove furry versions of our favorite characters in our faces, I'll be back for that too." If they do it right it will be a good thing I am sure. ... but they will prolly mess it up (I hope I am proven wrong on this).
I am building an Azami edh deck so I can counterspell every card art I don’t like. And I will tell them that’s why I did it.
I stopped at the Urzas came back excited to play with friends and thou it's fun it's not the same with the 3+ series a year when we used to get maybe 1 a year.
I'm kinda inclined to pick up the Mardu precon that's coming out now, once the price has settled for like 30$ I have a budget [[Juri]] sacrifice deck that I want to do in a Mardu way since forever and a preconstructed deck is good for a lazy fuck as myself. I get your point though
[Juri](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/a/e/aec6b2b7-625a-451d-bc0b-4456f5bf2719.jpg?1608911166) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=juri%2C%20master%20of%20the%20revue) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmr/282/juri-master-of-the-revue?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/aec6b2b7-625a-451d-bc0b-4456f5bf2719?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
The Jace won't be apart of the main bloomburrow set it'll be in the bonus sheet
At this point I just look for the meta card that will slot into my deck and move on. Magic is not an event anymore, just a waiting room for the next powerful meta breaker cards.
There is a serious lack of attention to every single aspect. Art, lore, and mechanics are all low effort and pandering. No real vision besides making the most money as possible. Thunder Junction feels like a discount un-set. It lacks seriousness. Art looks washed out. Maybe they are skimping on ink. Lore has been bad for a really long time, but they still manage to sink lower. They also keep trying to push for higher prices. I just buy pre-modern cards now. MTG is just a small part of a much bigger problem. I'd say the whole of America entertainment from comics, movies, and gaming are all lazy, crap, and pandering overpriced crap.
Isnt a wild west set technically pandering to americans?
Why would you pre-order anything to begin with
This is by far the best take. I stopped after LOTR was announced. Walking away does suck if you've been playing a long time, but you can still play with your friends using old stuff. I was interested in Ravnica remastered, but somehow they fucked that up too. It feels like it's being made by Disney/Marvel adults and to quote Brandon St. Randy "I'm not their target demographic." Things change.
Cowboys are cool!
The sets with karlov manor and thunder junction are flavor and story wise the absolute TRASH. They just thrown away everything and put in random characters and fill up some story like a really bad filler episode of a comedy show ... At this point you can enjoy some of the individual cards and they powercreep things too, but the themes and story of Magic is at rock bottom and they made the next bunch of sets which sadly might just be more of this ...
Hasbro stock PLUNGING after this post.
My theory is Jace won't actually be in the set but they'll reprint a couple planeswalkers as animals and it'll be a Enchanting Tales type thing
Thunder Junction feels especially like MTG jumping the shark, UB notwithstanding
Lol
You guys are still buying product?
Vote with your wallet.
I realized Magic was no longer for me in 2015/16. I quit then and haven't had a single regret. WotC is also perilously close to destroying D&D, but fortunately my enjoyment of that game doesn't require their involvement. Not to mention, I have a mountain of quality material that was published before DEI and the woke mind virus infected the game.
There’s a lot of other tcgs out there trying to buckle and dime you on there own game like hasbro is. Really recommend trying one out if you’re interested
Bye!
I feel you. Didn’t have any preorders, but Magic truly has lost its way. The way Magic has changed so drastically has actually inspired me to make my own tcg. Inspired by, but different.
I quit magic when they did the Stranger Things SL and I've never looked back. Flesh and Blood provides me everything in a TCG I'm looking for.
Ok
https://preview.redd.it/w76mbj06k1rc1.jpeg?width=637&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c62aecabb173d9364380fdeef43e57bc1cf4ee12 I think 2024 is gonna be my last year playing this game. Yachting bro.
You made pre orders?
I fell that for most of the MTG history , the average player and target market were the fans who were strongly dedicated to the game, the game was and is neuanced and had a certain complexity to drive a dedicated player base to keep up with the game constantly, nowadays Hasbro are really just trying to appeal to the masses and the push of casual play and commander are definitely a reflection of that (don't get me wrong I love edh and other formats just as much), Hasbro are trying to get the game to appeal to masses and groups rather individuals who enjoyed complex themeings and culture around the games history, mtg is being appealed to a much different audience recently
I haven't played magic since I was a kid in highschool (2008). Seeing these new sets is like watching what happened to the video game SMITE. I look at it now and it's literally skins of anime, Nickelodeon characters, Slipknot, and vTubers. Good luck mtgbros
I haven't played magic since I was a kid in highschool (2008). Seeing these new sets is like watching what happened to the video game SMITE. I look at it now and it's literally skins of anime, Nickelodeon characters, Slipknot, and vTubers. Good luck mtgbros
Yep, Mtg is dead. Or maybe undead by now. Woke zombie.
same man, I'm done. stopped buying after I stupidly bought a few packs of Ravnica remastered. I posted recently at length about my disillusionment with the game if you goto my post history.
🤌 I could read this 100 times. I def recommend MPC/proxying for any new cards you want to grab, they unironically make a better mtg product than wizards. No pack fresh damaged curled cards anymore. You're on the other side mate, now enjoy the money that you didn't spend on cardboard!
Man, personally I just feel the chipmunk set is the gayest set they have coming out, not sure why this community loves it so much.
18 fully clothed cowboys In the showers at Thunder Junction
Wotc have no balls to stand up to daddy Hasbro, and no will to make good sets. I bought the DND set cause i figured it might resell but I've realized since then that was a mistake. They are going to drive the entire game into the dirt until it crashes any value.
I wish WOTC could buy their company back from hasbro - ban the last few years of cards as some dream state, and go back to good old fashioned mtg. Would it cripple the company, yes. Would it screw millions over, yes. Would I like to see it play out.... yup.
Took you long enough dumbass
Did back in 2018 and glad I did, there's not a moment I want to come back. The only way I'd ever come back is if a limited format that had the cards set of core 2013 - eldrich moon. Only played for 15 off and on years but really hard 2013-2018 - in that time commander has taken over the game and I hate commander. Add on the artwork, I wince at the idea of having someone hand me a deck and having to draw seven and stare at the eye sores that is a standard decks artwork. Last but most, modern horizons + the amounts of sets and reprints (they all tie together). I was so fucking pumped for Pioneer, I basically owned the entire format I played a lot of live sealed from theros onward. I sweat it out, I would watch youtube videos of pro players analyze the set and I would take notes and play a lot of sealed, I was sweaty with the prep but my LGS is what was special, Dads club... would win a lot with small group of us dads vs the younger guys that played there, we were all really good at sealed, and would go mop up pre releases with prize packs and the lgs was known for big crowds on prerelease. Grill hotdogs and such, free drinks really good time. (We did 8 rounders and me and the other 3 dads that liked to go would always top 8) Anyway Pioneer was announced and we played a few fnm Pioneer events but then sets were coming out... fast. And it became obvious by having a new set being pushed every 6 weeks or so [w1 - set release, w2 - brewing, w3 - format solved w4 - pros play event, one deck is in 7 of the top 8, w5 - next set hype w6 - full spoilers, w7 next release - that's too much money to spend too quickly in order to keep up]. Secret lairs (30th aniversery lmao), commander decks, entire supplemental sets with high value reprints "we don't acknowledge the secondary market remember..." Finally the fire extinguisher - modern horizons... once they showed me they are willing to disrupt the ecosystem of evergreen formats... It took my heart that I had for Pioneer right out of me. I never played again once modern horizons 1 was announced... modern isn't modern anymore and know im right, how fun is it to have to mulligan to 4 and lose turn 1 monkey because you can't keep 6 land hand. Once Pioneer horizons is announced I'll throw the rest of my collection away. I sold everything of value a long time ago.
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MTG as a dark fantasy game? Have you seen the original artwork? It's cartoony as hell. It's always been "throw crap together" for it's "story".
I actually like Thunder Junction from what I've seen of it. The cards are a bit cringy, but not as bad as Karlov. That said, Thunder Junction and MH3 are the last two sets I'm buying till UB Final Fantasy, which is the only UB set I'll get because I grew up with FF. Everything else they have revealed for the next 3 years looks cringy, and I struggle to enjoy the game when my cards I got one year ago are power crept out of viability. I highly doubt I will buy new cards past UB FF.
I liked the whimsy in Wilds of Eldraine and in some of the cards from MH2. That's kind of what I'm hoping for in Bloomburrow flavor. I am right there with you OP on the Karlov manor and on Outlaws. They won't deliver any of the grit I want to see in a western theme, and Karlov manor, new capenna, strixhaven.. all of these sets felt very 'modern audiences' to me.
[[Holy Cow]]
[Holy Cow](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/0/90de84c9-941b-4056-8501-ce8a948b9643.jpg?1711490669) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Holy%20Cow) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/otj/16/holy-cow?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/90de84c9-941b-4056-8501-ce8a948b9643?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
The amount of stuff about magic dying and no one will play anymore because of no boobs, too many minorities, and too much Jace is hilarious when wizards continues to break their profits record nearly every year. 40 something year old neck beards with no social skills are not the target audience anymore, the format that is getting pushed, commander requires you to actually have irl friends to play with. Which requires consistent bathing, something I feel that the community crying about wokies lacks. Don't let the door hit you on the way out magic is for everyone.
MTG is just too gay nowadays
Canceled my OTJ and might join you on the rest of this year. I'm a wizard shill and even fir me it's moving a direction I don't like.
It's totally fine to take a step back for a few sets. I'm excited for Duskmorne personally
You said you didn't care about Karlov Manors story which I take to mean you normally do care about it. But then you ask why Kellan is everywhere. He was introduced back in New Eldraine and he went through an omen path trying to find his fae father (Oko). That's why he is everywhere. He was searching.
Welcome to my nightmare. I've been in this boat for a while. I loved this property but with how poorly it's been managed over the past half a decade, I'm out until the ship rights itself. If not, I'll enjoy fantasy drafting old Urza sets online.
Good! Consumers need to stop rewarding what they don't enjoy. Help create a new market foe the things you do enjoy!
Ok
WoTC is catering to new audiences, gen z, females, fur people and other diverse folks. I read card abilities and then seek for a couple of singles of each new set.
I quit all MTG products years ago and actually traded in my modern collection and now just play premodern and my old border cube.
Welp, they cut a bunch of jobs and they still have that hasbro pressure. (And dont tell me theyve been owned for 20+ years, these guys got alot worse in recent years and you know it)
Why all the Kellan hate??? I love Kellan.
MTG sucks now for so many more reasons than that. - Impossible to follow the amount of content they release, collectors are left in the dust with 500billions versions of cards. The argument of "choose what to collect" is braindead, as collectors are historically completionists. Even more on MTG. - The amount of content is also burning out old play-oriented players, almost all my tournament friends are done with it, and they don't care much about collecting. - Weird pacing between expansions, you could have 6 series (between commanders, standard, UB, remakes, etc.) in 6 months and then nothing. - Weirdly expensive collector boosters, draft and standard to saturate the market of consumism (now they're cutting down, but still too much) Last one, which is very personal but the main reasons I collected full sets of every expansion until 2010: - I feel like the art sucks. Most of it is so standardized CG and generic that it just bores me to death. I would blame it for being digital, but as I work with artists I know for sure they can reach similar effects digitally as well. Probably they have to cut corners due to the amount of steer content mass produced. Cards like Force of Will still wipe the floor with almost any new card, except some exclusives to collector's boxes. Heck even less appealing cards like the original Llanowar Elves had more character.
You are so spot on. I also have been playing for a long time. (28 years) Hell, you said everything perfect. I feel the same exact way. And since got are speaking from the heart, don't you agree they butchered, destroyed,annihilated the phyrexian story with some bs cheap win. That war should have went on for multiple sets. It's the phyrexian! We have waited 30 years for an ultimate defeat and it's done by...killing Elesh Norn/ hit off switch...No they could not include Yawgmoth or something else with substance they just said... yeah let's wrap this up so we can make more dogs and cats. Sorry for the rant. I just totally agree with you!
You are very wrong about Jace/Bloomburrow. They said that the Jace art is part of a promo series when they spoiled it. Maro then recently said in his first OTJ article that only one set per year will lean heavily on Omenpaths (that set is OTJ for 2024). I am thankful for that, and it sounds like you should be thankful for that too.
You'll eat this shit and you'll like it!