Commander: EDH Precons with 51 new Eternal-only cards out next June

[Nihil Credo]

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/594


Magic: The Gathering Commander is composed of five different hundred-card decks, with no card other than basic lands appearing more than once per deck.There are a total of 51 new Magic cards spread across them. And each deck comes with three foil oversized versions of legends that also appear as regular cards in the deck. You can buy one of these decks and play it out of the box, or cannibalize it for your existing EDH decks. Sorry, that should now be "your existing Magic: The Gathering Commander decks." The 51 new cards will be legal in Eternal formats (that's Vintage and Legacy), but they will not be legal in Standard, Extended, or Block Constructed.

Release Date: June 17, 2011
MSRP: $29.99First one revealed (don't get too excited, although it's not bad either):

http://i.imgur.com/iZNYP.jpg (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1174)

And the second, a strictly multiplayer tool:

http://i.imgur.com/Vk0Y2.jpg (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1174)

[Zach Tartell]

That whole thing][/URL]

That's fairly super exciting. I wonder what kind of stuff they'll be putting into the decks that they don't want to be standard/et cetera legal. (http://www.elephantartgallery.com/paintings/)

(Sorry, I just figured out that you can buy art that's painted by elephants and I'm thinking of dropping like six or eight hundred bucks on myself for Hanukkah)

[Meekrab]

I'm pumped to cast Reanimate targeting this guy, he looks mean:

http://media.wizards.com/images/magic/daily/arcana/594_aoincpuwrp.jpg

[alphacat]

51 eternal only cards sounds awesome. However, if 'death by dragon' is any indication, most will be overcosted casual fodder. I do hope there are a few whacky cards specifically made for legacy and vintage that is unprintable in standard though. One can only hope that 10% of the new cards would be useful for eternal, eh?

[Mr.C]

51 eternal only cards sounds awesome. However, if 'death by dragon' is any indication, most will be overcosted casual fodder. I do hope there are a few whacky cards specifically made for legacy and vintage that is unprintable in standard though. One can only hope that 10% of the new cards would be useful for eternal, eh?

I hope not. Everyone remembers what happened the last time precon decks had super-playable constructed cards, right?

[morgan_coke]

I hope not. Everyone remembers what happened the last time precon decks had super-playable constructed cards, right?

People bought them and were happy?

You're one of the people who complained about "secret treasures" aren't you?

[Bigface]

Well, Karador isn't that bad in a Reanimator EDH. Can't see him played in Eternal though.

[Valrina]

and now i am going to build a deck with this centaur chieftan ^^

i am sure ..something rock like and... dont know loam... ah I will find a way since I love the artwork ^^

eternal only cards are great wizards...now give me my 1.5 protour and I will start playing more regulary again ^^

[Mr.C]

People bought them and were happy?

You're one of the people who complained about "secret treasures" aren't you?

You're new, aren't you?

I'm talking about Rat's Nest, except this would be worse, as the cards cannot be obtained in packs. I thought that was obvious.

[Nihil Credo]

What exactly was the problem with Rat's Nest? It had Jitte in it and sold like hot cakes on a snow day. Who was harmed?

[Mr.C]

What exactly was the problem with Rat's Nest? It had Jitte in it and sold like hot cakes on a snow day. Who was harmed?

Availability?

[alphacat]

Availability?

How is availability of Jitte harmed when there are more jitte in production than other rares?

If you're talking about the precon, availability was also not an issue, issue was price. Chase cards have been included in precon products before and after rat's nest, people have dealt with it before, they will continue to deal with it.

What I'm excited about is how this product allows wizards to create cards specifically for eternal without considering impact on limited, block, or standard. If they can take full advantage of this, I see some very interesting cards created to shake up eternal.

[Wilkin]

So there's going to be another G/B/W commander (wow, so used to saying General) on top of the one that is spolied?

I like this announcement. Lol, I wonder how many of those 51 cards will be Legacy or Vintage Viable. Judging from that new red card, not much. But that scary looking creature with the swords looks like a Reanimation or/Show and Tell target. :D

[Nekrataal]

Before some guys start complaining about it: This is so damn good! Wizards starts to acknowledge casual formats more and more but printing 51 extra cards that can be used in eternal formats is awesome. However I do not expect to find a lot of legacy playables among that 51 but anyway there will be eventually something B I G that can be "sneaked" ond S&T into play ;) Who knows? It also makes me dream of an "acknowledge legacy" era to come where they will print 51 missing pieces to certain legacy decktypes to make our format even more exciting to play with an even wider variaty of competitive decks. Not that I would think this possible any time soon.

[(nameless one)]

Dear WotC,

Please print more rebels to help Lin Sivvi be a more decent general.

-(nameless one)

Other than that, this is awesome. I doubt they will print something Legacy broken though.

[jakolhops]

I think this is a good idea. I love EDH and this apeals to casual and collectors as well as competative players.

[Tammit67]

My only concern is they want to change the name of the format. Seems they want not just to contribute, but to control this market?

[rockout]

The new general is actually good. I am shocked wizards. Helping edh/commander makes all those junk rares stores have sitting in boxes become worth something and if it helps local stores stay afloat I'm all for awesome commander precons.

[kiblast]

Availability?

what's the point with you? if they sell a Jace 2.0 vs Sorin duel deck at 29.99$, would you still complain? ok they would go sold out after 12 minutes, but then the price of Jace would fall at least of 20-25%....the same with Jitte. The more they print, lower the card cost.

[majikal]

Maybe we'll finally see those snow-covered duals...

[alphacat]

My only problem with this is the same as with any of the new constructed products, poor card choices. If you look at the last two multiplayer format decks, all of the decks are basically a random assortment of forgotten cards that nobody wants. It really feels like they don't want to put too many good cards in the decks, even if the cards will have almost no effect on the secondary market.

Take Fire and Lightning for example, they printed Chain Lightning, yet skipped other burn staples such as rift bolt, lava spike and magma jet. It seems like they feel the need to NOT make any competitive decks out of the box even though they clearly know what makes a deck competitive. I really doubt wizards' ability to choose cards we want for these decks.

[GGoober]

I approve of this, basically the previous incompetent EDH rules committee needs a more reasonable and well-thought out banlist. It just pains to see their ban philosophies make no sense or contradict each other (e.g. cards that cost $$$ should be banned, oh hai Workshop, cards that are overly played and skew the format should be banned, oh hai metalworker and hai ROFLos who-was-unbanned-as-a-general).

Here's hoping WotC DCI actually does something useful with the banlist. I enjoy EDH but not when the rules aren't set solidly in stone. WotC will make it a little more competitive, which would point it in a more organized direction.

[Mr.C]

what's the point with you? if they sell a Jace 2.0 vs Sorin duel deck at 29.99$, would you still complain? ok they would go sold out after 12 minutes, but then the price of Jace would fall at least of 20-25%....the same with Jitte. The more they print, lower the card cost.

Sorry, what part of NOT AVAILABLE ANYWHERE ELSE do you guys fail to understand? With rat's nest, the precon just disappeared from the market. Imagine if that was the only way of getting Jitte?

Mind you, I love this idea, and I will be buying at least one of these, if not all of them. But it is a small concern in the back of my mind.

Geez.

[morgan_coke]

Sorry, what part of NOT AVAILABLE ANYWHERE ELSE do you guys fail to understand? With rat's nest, the precon just disappeared from the market. Imagine if that was the only way of getting Jitte?

Mind you, I love this idea, and I will be buying at least one of these, if not all of them. But it is a small concern in the back of my mind.

Geez.

So, let me get this straight. Your problem is .... you think you might not get to buy one. So therefore it's bad? Wow. Self-center much?

[Shimi]

Sorry, what part of NOT AVAILABLE ANYWHERE ELSE do you guys fail to understand? With rat's nest, the precon just disappeared from the market. Imagine if that was the only way of getting Jitte?

Mind you, I love this idea, and I will be buying at least one of these, if not all of them. But it is a small concern in the back of my mind.

Geez.

Agree with you.

Let's say they print a some legacy stample in this EDH decks , then you need 4 of , so you need to buy 4 EDH "XYZ" Deck to use just 4 copies of this new stample but what happens when the stores have just 100 decks but there are 100 legacy players that wish to get FOUR copies of this deck.. hope this don't come truth.

[dontbiteitholmes]

what's the point with you? if they sell a Jace 2.0 vs Sorin duel deck at 29.99$, would you still complain? ok they would go sold out after 12 minutes, but then the price of Jace would fall at least of 20-25%....the same with Jitte. The more they print, lower the card cost.

You guys are totally missing his point. First off I don't think this will be an issue but the potential is there. So he says availability was an issue with Rat's Nest which was true. I was totally willing to buy one well over retail at the time but despite everyone selling it for way over retail you couldn't find them anywhere. Now everyone is coming back with, "But there were still lots of Jitte's and Jace 2.0 this and that." Missing the point much?

Here's the scenario he's worried about. If something Legacy playable shows up in these packs it will be a 1x obviously since that's the entire point. Now imagine it's playable as a 4x. Now you have to buy 4x of these box sets to get a playset. Not only is that kind of expensive, but if everyone is going out and buying 4x of this one deck with the playable card and there are 5x different decks than one deck will sell out in record time while the other decks will sit on shelves for a while (no store owner is going to restock if only 1/5 of the decks are selling out, they will wait for the entire stock to deplete before restocking). All of a sudden there is a shortage of whatever card because it is maybe 2 of in a case of 10 precons. So say the average store buys 2 boxes and takes a month to sell all the precons. That means you see one playset per store per month of whatever chase card is in the deck if that (since some stores will take more than a month to sell out especially if 2 of the decks are way crappy). Big stores will sell out of the hot one basically the second the box hits the shelves since they will sell at retail regardless and the other decks will sit there even longer. So meanwhile there's a shortage, not like if Jace 2.0 was in a box set or the time Jitte was in a precon. Imagine if Jitte wasn't in a set and the only way to get it was from the precon and people wanted it as a 4x, that is the kind of shortage he's worried about.

Not saying I think it's going to happen, just saying that's the danger.

Edit - LOL I typed to slow, he already replied with basically the same thing I said.

[Sims]

So, let me get this straight. Your problem is .... you think you might not get to buy one. So therefore it's bad? Wow. Self-center much?

No, i don't think it's self centered. I think it's reasonable and valid that someone is worried about availability of potentially playable cards in limited run, pre-con decks that aren't in print in any other set. That's pretty valid. He's not saying that the idea is bad, but that the idea of the next Jace 2 or Vengevine being available only in a limited edition precon is pretty shitty, because the card value will make Jace 2 look cheap.

That's a format concern, not a self-centered "omg what if i can't get one."

[Mana Drain]

"You can buy one of these decks and play it out of the box, or cannibalize it for your existing EDH decks. Sorry, that should now be "your existing Magic: The Gathering Commander decks."


Fuck you Wizards. We'll call the format whatever we want. You didn't invent this one, control-freaks.

[2Rach]

Fuck you Wizards. We'll call the format whatever we want. You didn't invent this one, control-freaks.
Please ragequit now. Highlander movie series got to it before WOTC did.

[dontbiteitholmes]

So, let me get this straight. Your problem is .... you think you might not get to buy one. So therefore it's bad? Wow. Self-center much?

No, get this straight, you're missing his point. It's not that he won't be able to buy it, everyone won't be able to buy it. If the card in the deck is in demand every store owner is going to know. First off that means the one deck will cost way more then the others ala Rat's Nest. Then the card in the deck would be super rare and only available in the deck everyone wants it, even people who don't plan on playing it. So everyone is asking the store owner to please let them be the first to buy it, many store owners will take the deck out of the box before displaying it and either sell it on Ebay or sell it to their friends who are begging them to buy it over retail. So the point is, if this were to happen you won't be able to buy it, I won't be able to buy it, he won't be able to buy it, no one will have a fair chance at getting the deck. There will be about one playset a month per store if that of whatever chase card and it will be up to the store owner if you even have a chance of buying it as it may never make it to shelves if demand is high enough.

[samurai_socks]

Magic: The Gathering Commander will be available in multiple languages. In addition to English, you'll be able to buy these decks in French, German, Italian, Japanese, and Spanish.

These are going to be expensive if there are a couple cards that are good. My guess is that there will be a couple of fringe playable cards within the 51 that they are printing. There will probably only be 1 or 2 cards that will be worthy of maindecks in legacy.

-Cheers-

[Nekrataal]

Maybe we'll finally see those snow-covered duals...

LOL - nice cheat around that reserved list policy. Me likes

[Gheizen64]

LOL - nice cheat around that reserved list policy. Me likes


This. They can do functional reprints without worring about Standard and Extended.

Go dual with differents name FTW.

[morgan_coke]

Are you people fucking kidding me? Let's try this scenario in a different light:

"There is a man on the corner giving out free popsicles. Person 1, yay, I like popsicles, and so do a lot of other people. This is good. Person 2, this is bad, I like popsicles, and I like that they're free, but if I'm not assured of the chance to get one, then I don't think anyone should have that chance. It's bad that he's giving out popsicles."

Yes, the second guy is you morons who think the decks are a bad idea. Congrats on being a bunch of useless motherfuckers who can't see the universe extending past their own nose.

[GGoober]

You know what I'm terrified now? Card prices going even higher, and I mean cards that are Legacy AND EDH playable. Start grabbing more staples. Being an "official" WotC format will only make this 'dumb' yet fun format even more popular.

And I personally think Library of Alexandria is heading towards something insane soon. It has potential to be unbanned in Legacy, ME5 has printed them, and with WotC governing part of EDH rules, I can see LoA coming off the EDH banlist, and seriously jacking up some prices.

My opinions though :)

Oh and start grabbing tons of Mana Crypt/Sol Rings, unless they get banned in EDH from WotC's perspective. I wonder how sanctioned EDH tournaments will be, mostly 1v1/multiplayer? If it's 1v1, I actually dig this format. I love competitive 1v1 EDH. It's more 'fun' and broken than Legacy lol.

[dontbiteitholmes]

And I personally think Library of Alexandria is heading towards something insane soon. It has potential to be unbanned in Legacy, ME5 has printed them, and with WotC governing part of EDH rules, I can see LoA coming off the EDH banlist, and seriously jacking up some prices.


LOL, and what gives you that idea. LoA has potential to be unbanned in Legacy because? You guys do realize just because the same half-dozen people say Mana Drain and Library of Alexandria are safe to unban in every thread doesn't make it any more true. ME5 doesn't exist so I assume you mean ME4 which also has Sol Ring, Mana Vault, and Time Vault so I guess we can expect all those to change ban/restriction status soon as well? Oh wait, the only potential LoA has to be unbanned in Legacy is the same potential it's always had. Wizards could unban it if they wanted, but they are fairly conservative (see Land Tax) and there is absolutely no evidence AT ALL they are planning on doing that.

Also as far as new dual lands in these things that would be a nightmare as far as the unlikely but scary scenario already laid out in this thread, but the fact that Wizards is willing to print new cards that will not appear in T2 is a good sign for Eternal. Maybe one day we will see a Masters Edition IRL.

[Gheizen64]

LOL, and what gives you that idea. LoA has potential to be unbanned in Legacy because? You guys do realize just because the same half-dozen people say Mana Drain and Library of Alexandria are safe to unban in every thread doesn't make it any more true. ME5 doesn't exist so I assume you mean ME4 which also has Sol Ring, Mana Vault, and Time Vault so I guess we can expect all those to change ban/restriction status soon as well? Oh wait, the only potential LoA has to be unbanned in Legacy is the same potential it's always had. Wizards could unban it if they wanted, but they are fairly conservative (see Land Tax) and there is absolutely no evidence AT ALL they are planning on doing that.

Also as far as new dual lands in these things that would be a nightmare as far as the unlikely but scary scenario already laid out in this thread, but the fact that Wizards is willing to print new cards that will not appear in T2 is a good sign for Eternal. Maybe one day we will see a Masters Edition IRL.

Why would new duals a nightmare? Unless they print better version of the duals (impossible) the new dual would just add some offer on the market.

[Mr.C]

Are you people fucking kidding me? Let's try this scenario in a different light:

"There is a man on the corner giving out free popsicles. Person 1, yay, I like popsicles, and so do a lot of other people. This is good. Person 2, this is bad, I like popsicles, and I like that they're free, but if I'm not assured of the chance to get one, then I don't think anyone should have that chance. It's bad that he's giving out popsicles."

Yes, the second guy is you morons who think the decks are a bad idea. Congrats on being a bunch of useless motherfuckers who can't see the universe extending past their own nose.

You should lay off the coke. It impairs your thinking. Read all those posts above you. Specifically where I said I LOVE THIS IDEA. I am concerned about the general populace of Magic players, because while I am certain I will get my playsets of those 51 cards, other people may not be so lucky.

Funny you should talk about noses, given your handle and all.

[rleader]

Let's look at a close precedent: Swords to Plowshares only being available through a coldsnap theme deck on MTGO. Did people shell out $50 for a playset of four? Yes. Was it fair? Questionable. OTOH, there wasn't a distribution problem with them having to print an equal amount of Kjeldorans and Auroch decks; they could sell as many of the former as there were buyers.

Yet additional ways to get StP eventually arrived. I'm guessing if any of these cards become a hit, they'll be endlessly reprinted but far enough apart to keep direct sales highly monetized. Fair? Questionable.



all of the decks are basically a random assortment of forgotten cards

No, not random; a lot of the same cards show up over and over again. (Taurean Mauler, etc.) Which is kind of boring. "Hi I'm good only at multiplayer" cards can sort of suck that way.

[Mr.C]

Let's look at a close precedent: Swords to Plowshares only being available through a coldsnap theme deck on MTGO. Did people shell out $50 for a playset of four? Yes. Was it fair? Questionable. OTOH, there wasn't a distribution problem with them having to print an equal amount of Kjeldorans and Auroch decks; they could sell as many of the former as there were buyers.

Yet additional ways to get StP eventually arrived. I'm guessing if any of these cards become a hit, they'll be endlessly reprinted but far enough apart to keep direct sales highly monetized. Fair? Questionable.




No, not random; a lot of the same cards show up over and over again. (Taurean Mauler, etc.) Which is kind of boring. "Hi I'm good only at multiplayer" cards can sort of suck that way.

As far as I know, and correct me if I'm wrong here, WotC never sells out of online product, as long as it's in print. The same is not true of paper products.

[rleader]

That was the point I was making. Maybe you read that one sentence as if I had a questionmark or something; we're on the same page here, I'm guessing.

I'm not sure WoTC totally understands it though. They probably saw that paper Slivers decks from TSP were selling for $30 and thought people would pay that for their foilies. OTOH, part of the reason the slivers deck was $30 was that SCG and co. had to buy boxes of 12 decks at a time and needed to give people a reason to look at the storm or white weenie decks as a good deal in an attempt to sell decks consistantly across the board.

[Ubiquitous Druid]

As far as I know, and correct me if I'm wrong here, WotC never sells out of online product, as long as it's in print. The same is not true of paper products.

That's exactly where this development is heading though. Wizards is finally finding a way to justify reprinting cards that would warp standard and extended by their presence. This brings eternal back into the domain of their profitability. Thus, if it makes them money, they can't just keep making more. And they can just keep reprinting these things, because they will be relevant only in the eternal market thus allowing them to change eternal without causing repurcussive changes to other competitive formats. It also would allow for other marketing schemes by which they could draw more players into eternal formats by creating a way to buy into it via packs.

This has the potential to be a huge boon for eternal players everywhere, but also the exact opposite as the whole concept of the Mythic Rare starts to bleed into the price-structure of a format with an already over-the-top price structure.

Does anyone else feel like Wizards is getting to the point where they can actually just print money?

[dahcmai]

I know a little bit about card prices.

Library of Alexandria has a possibility of coming off the list, but it's really, really small. It's still a massively powerful card, I don't care what anyone says. I have played with that thing in 5 color control during the old days. It's a little strong for legacy and vintage. I seriously doubt they would be that dumb. My Landstill would love the crap out of that. If anything the bitchmoaning about price alone would be tremendous. The thing is a one sided howling mine. Cmon. Vintage could handle that, but Legacy? Nah.


Anyway, this commander thing is meh. I like the idea they plan to support it, but I hate whoever this marketing idiot is. Branding something under the name of Commander? "Want to play some Commander?". Sounds like shit. "Want to play some EDH?". Yeah, it does have a ring. Should have left that one alone. I bet people will still call it EDH despite anything Wizards does. That name is just crap. I used to be a VP for an advertising agency. lol They must have put the guy who picks the foils for FNM in charge of that name. Sometimes cool, sometimes OMGWTF?

I kind of hope they don't accidentally make a Legacy staple for these though. The people are right about it shooting up in price due to availability. FTV sets ring a bell? Those didn't really even have that much good in them. EDH has personally raised the price on some cards quite a bit on accident due to popularity. Go buy a Sol Ring and see. Vintage is the only format that uses that and it's still expensive as hell due to it gaining notoriety in EDH despite the decline of Vintage. Timetwister alone has went back up and it's not because of some use coming back to Vintage. That thing should be dropping hard.

Rat's nest is a decent example. It did go nuts when released though it was due to standard people wanting them more than anything else. Standard controls prices the most. Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed is the prime poster child of what you should be fearing. That card was a $8 card for the longest time. When it became legal in eternal it didn't change price. When EDH became popular, it went over $100. It sucks in anything else. This is what we should fear.

Can you imagine if something along the lines of the Duals were in these? They can't technically make a functional reprint, but if they are only eternal legal, it does open up a gate for cards that shouldn't be in standard. I fully expect Sliver Queen as a reprint in a larger size. It only makes sense to do that one. I expect a few of the older legends to appear as "commanders". Why not? You want Bartel Runeaxe as a General, but he's old and hard to find. Easy fix. The size of the cards makes them bypass the reserve list for the commanders at least.

The cards more than likely will be the super staples that everyone should be able to get. Rhystic Study, Mind's eye, Oblivion Stone, Vedalken Orrery, Barter in Blood, and stuff like that. I really expect a ton of the crap rares that people love and use.


So this can go either way. Personally, I am happy about it (well, other than the name).

[sunshine]

My only concern is they want to change the name of the format. Seems they want not just to contribute, but to control this market?

At least you didn't just register bostonedh.com (http://www.bostonedh.com) :cry:

[Bardo]

Wizards of the Coast and the DCI are not "taking over" the format! We will not be managing the rules or the banned list of the Commander format, instead leaving it in the capable hands of Sheldon Menery and his rules team. They deserve all the credit for this format's popularity and we don't want to mess with a good thing!

Cool announcement. Good to see that WotC is not going to control what is a fan-made and supported format.

On the change of the format name, I'm sad about that because "Elder Dragon Highlander" is all sorts of awesome words. Way Back in the Day, you had to use an elder dragon (Palladia Mors, etc.) but that hasn't been the case ever since the format has been vaguely popular. And it's awfully odd to have a deck with Phelddagrif as your general in your Elder Dragon Highlander Deck. So I can understand the name change for practical reasons.

Overall, thumbs up.

[dontbiteitholmes]

Why would new duals a nightmare? Unless they print better version of the duals (impossible) the new dual would just add some offer on the market.

I meant in the scenario that they were printed in a box set like this. I wouldn't be opposed to snow covered dual lands but I think if they printed them the best way to go would be to print for example...

Snow-Covered Taiga

Snow Land - Forest Mountain

This card counts as a Taiga.
Tap add R or G to your mana pool.

Or instead of counting as normal dual lands also have the line.
When in play this card counts as a Forest and a Mountain

So that they can't be fetched. I don't think making everyone buy 2 sets of dual lands that are equally good is a very hot idea.

Anyways that's not really on topic, just if they were to print something like that in a set like this we would be facing the "OMG impossible to find even at 3x retail," Scenario. I think that WoTC being open to printing cards that are not legal in T2 or Extended is progress though in the right direction.

[AngryTroll]

I'm excited about the new "Wedge" Generals. I really want to play GBW and/or UWR, but the only general choices are Doran, the Siege Tower and Teneb, the Harvester and Numot, the Devastator. Don't get me wrong, Teneb is awesome...but I like to have some choices! I have some pretty awesome UWr cards that want to see play in EDH, and now they might actually get a chance to make it into a list together.

[Valrina]

Jeah Snow coverd duals ftw ^^

I personaly love the idea of printing eternal cards that never hit standart, I hope they will do it more regulary now...and that the print runs are high enough, and that they play around the reprint rule that way...and love for eternal from wizards and.... damn this seems more unrealistic as longer as I talk...

but I still have hope !!

[JeroenC]

My only concern is they want to change the name of the format. Seems they want not just to contribute, but to control this market?

Here's hoping WotC DCI actually does something useful with the banlist. I enjoy EDH but not when the rules aren't set solidly in stone. WotC will make it a little more competitive, which would point it in a more organized direction.

The name change was mostly done due to legal reasons, and they have once again stated that they have no interest in taking control of the format away from Sheldon Menery, though they do intend to work more closely with him and the rest of the "Council" for EDH (or whatever the official naming is).

Also, about people hoping for eternal viable cards in this: I sure hope not. These will be singleton decks, so if they print (for a stupid example) a functional reprint of a dual land in one of them, that would force every eternal player to buy 4 of these decks, which is the same as saying "whomever manages to get his hands on four of these for a huge price, have fun in Legacy, the others, well deal with it". This would also be lame as hell for the actual casual players who would be forced to pay at least double if they ever wanted to get their hands on one of these. Methinks no actually eternal viable cards and mehopes so too.


what's the point with you? if they sell a Jace 2.0 vs Sorin duel deck at 29.99$, would you still complain? ok they would go sold out after 12 minutes, but then the price of Jace would fall at least of 20-25%....the same with Jitte. The more they print, lower the card cost.
Well you would be a very lucky man to find a store that's stupid enough to sell a DD with Jace 2.0 at 30 bucks, so I'd complain because no store around here is that dumb.

[Bardo]

Moved to Community.

[mchainmail]

The name change was mostly done due to legal reasons, and they have once again stated that they have no interest in taking control of the format away from Sheldon Menery, though they do intend to work more closely with him and the rest of the "Council" for EDH (or whatever the official naming is).

Also, about people hoping for eternal viable cards in this: I sure hope not. These will be singleton decks, so if they print (for a stupid example) a functional reprint of a dual land in one of them, that would force every eternal player to buy 4 of these decks, which is the same as saying "whomever manages to get his hands on four of these for a huge price, have fun in Legacy, the others, well deal with it". This would also be lame as hell for the actual casual players who would be forced to pay at least double if they ever wanted to get their hands on one of these. Methinks no actually eternal viable cards and mehopes so too.


Well you would be a very lucky man to find a store that's stupid enough to sell a DD with Jace 2.0 at 30 bucks, so I'd complain because no store around here is that dumb.

I don't know if *no* eternally viable cards is the right viewpoint. What if they printed a card like this:

Barbed Ring

Land

T: Add R.

Threshold - Sacrifice this: Deal 3 to target creature or player.



Would most of us really care?

[Tammit67]

The name change was mostly done due to legal reasons, and they have once again stated that they have no interest in taking control of the format away from Sheldon Menery, though they do intend to work more closely with him and the rest of the "Council" for EDH (or whatever the official naming is).

If they weren't looking to take some control over the format, there wouldn't be a legal need to change the name :/ Not that it sounds like a legal reason any way:
The format is now known as "Commander." The titles "Elder Dragon Highlander" and "EDH" are going away. It's not that we don't like those names necessarily (and I'm sure that many of you will keep using them), but we want to sync up our terminology. We've been calling it "Commander" on Magic Online for some time now, and we introduced the "command zone" as part of the game last year, so that term shouldn't be unfamiliar. Your "general" will now be known as your "commander."
Just seems like the change was unnecessary. Call me paranoid

[Gocho]

I don't know if *no* eternally viable cards is the right viewpoint. What if they printed a card like this:

Barbed Ring

Land

T: Add R.

Threshold - Sacrifice this: Deal 3 to target creature or player.



Would most of us really care?

I want 4, you can use them in almost any Red Deck with no drawbacks.
Yes, it's wasteable, but making damage at late game is always the Burn decks weakness

[freakish777]

Barbed Ring

Land

T: Add R.

Threshold - Sacrifice this: Deal 3 to target creature or player.

Seems pretty sick.

Not for burn, for Loam. It gives them a much better answer to things than Barbarian Ring (no dealing damage to you, no having to tap it, no having to tap anything else either, 3 damage instead of 2).

If it were also a Mountain and ETB tapped, I would definitely play it (Oh Hai Scalding Tarn, I need you to be a Lightning Bolt instead for me, can you do that please?).


I would be 1000% behind Snow-Covered/Functional Reprint Dual lands. Even if they weren't Forest Swamps and were just "Tap for Green or Black" lands.


As far as the whole concern of availability, the obvious problem with morgan_coke's analogy is that the person is handing something out for free. That doesn't happen in real life. Wizards puts a $30 MSRP on these. And if there's a ton of Legacy staples that these are the only way to get them (and there's no real alternatives to these, as in they aren't just a new Swords to Plowshares variant), then some people are not going to be able to get the cards to play their decks. Then after Wizards sets the MSRPs, SCG and every other seller goes "Nope, $150 a piece because these new cards are bonkers"), still sell out on pre-orders, and then only the few lucky people who managed to pre-order them have any (and few of them are interested in eBaying the cards they need). If Wizards prints an amount such that demand is met well, than cool. If they don't, well than they need to get their act together and bring in some better economists to gauge demand so their supply meets it.


For instance, what if a Tribal Goblin instant were printed at 1 Red mana that exiled target creature, and had some draw back (that creatures controller may deal damage to target creature or player equal to the exiled creatures casting cost?). That's not a card with any alternative to it (you either go get your copy out of the EDH box, or you can't play it).

Ultimately, the most competitive tournaments will be the one's where the card availability of any given card for any given player is 100%. That's why SCG started doing 10 card proxies for their P9 tournaments back when they were running Vintage events instead of 5ks.

[dahcmai]

I still want fetchable dual reprints of a sort. Snow duals would be great, but only as long as they had the land types. Otherwise, I'd just play the ones we have already and nothing would change.

That land is busted even more in 43 land. Hell yeahs having a B ring that is actually better.

Anyway, back to the point. I really only want one big thing that it seems they are actually going to do. Print some more generals in the Planar Chaos dragons colors. I am tired of needing to use Vorosh for every single deck I make with UBG. There's no other general for that slice of colors. I like Vorosh and he's awesome, but I am tired of him having to be the pick for my favorite color combination.

[Aggro_zombies]

Anyway, back to the point. I really only want one big thing that it seems they are actually going to do. Print some more generals in the Planar Chaos dragons colors. I am tired of needing to use Vorosh for every single deck I make with UBG. There's no other general for that slice of colors. I like Vorosh and he's awesome, but I am tired of him having to be the pick for my favorite color combination.
Amen to this. I'm hoping for something good here, as my dredge deck needs something more on-theme than him.

[Parax]

.

Take Fire and Lightning for example, they printed Chain Lightning, yet skipped other burn staples such as rift bolt, lava spike and magma jet. It seems like they feel the need to NOT make any competitive decks out of the box even though they clearly know what makes a deck competitive. I really doubt wizards' ability to choose cards we want for these decks.

Personally precons tend to be for the newer sect of customers, and i really do believe that if they make an "OMG THIS DECK IS BROKEN" out of the box, where is the room to improve the deck? As a deckbuilder (Yes it is part of the game, more for the newer players than the older, as we the older ones, net deck 9 times out of 10) you want to leave some room for improving the deck.

[mchainmail]

Seems pretty sick.

Not for burn, for Loam. It gives them a much better answer to things than Barbarian Ring (no dealing damage to you, no having to tap it, no having to tap anything else either, 3 damage instead of 2).


Is it playable in Burn? Yes.

Are players chomping at the bit to play burn? No!

Is it good in lands? Yeah, but that's what, 1% of the meta?


The point is there are cards that can support fringe strategies that can safely be printed without causing too much outcry.

[Dan Turner]

I wonder if something like this would work well with the new wedge comanders



Ozark Mountain Meadow

Legendary Land-Forest


~enters the Battlefield tapped

T: Add (r), (g) or (w)

It is not inherently broken can be fetched and not required as a 4 of in legacy or vintage

[Tammit67]

Is it playable in Burn? Yes.

Are players chomping at the bit to play burn? No!



Have you EVER been to MTG Salvation?

[dontbiteitholmes]

Are you people fucking kidding me? Let's try this scenario in a different light:

"There is a man on the corner giving out free popsicles. Person 1, yay, I like popsicles, and so do a lot of other people. This is good. Person 2, this is bad, I like popsicles, and I like that they're free, but if I'm not assured of the chance to get one, then I don't think anyone should have that chance. It's bad that he's giving out popsicles."

Yes, the second guy is you morons who think the decks are a bad idea. Congrats on being a bunch of useless motherfuckers who can't see the universe extending past their own nose.

Hey, I don't really care. If I want whatever card may theoretically come out I'll get 4x of it. The problem is I'll end up buying it off Ebay from a store owner who took the deck out of the box before he ever put it on the shelf. No one else is going to get one unless they go online and pay out the ass, then I'll trade the EDH crap off (which will also be worth a lot because no EDH players were able to buy the coveted box) or throw it in the garbage.

Let's try this scenario. There is a man on the corner giving out free popsickles on a hot day. Everyone gets in line to get one around the block. Then I walk up and cut the line with my friends who like popsickles and drop a $50 bill on the table and offer to buy all the cherry and blueberry flavored ones. Of course dude sells me them and I walk off, everyone left in line can suck on the lemon, mango, and black licorice ones that nobody wants.

Of course there could just end up being no new Legacy playables in the box. Having new Legacy cards is exciting if they don't release them all weird, like packaged with 5/6 crappy decks no one wants. I wish we could get an Eternal/EDH/Casual set maybe once a year. Just a small set, like a small M11 with some new/some old and rotate it a little every year. That way they could print a lot of stuff that would be way too good in T2/Ext but is all too fair in Eternal and it would also be a reasonable place to reprint Legacy stuff that would break Standard in half (Daze for example).

[bloodbrother]

New Dual Lands are the most viable candidate for these 51 new cards for eternal. Then maybe fixed versions of legacy banned cards. This is their only way out of the reprint policy and I don't think they'll waste the chance. See the FTV series and judge foils, they reprinted Wheel of Fortune, Sol Ring etc. And after they revised the reprint policy not to print something on the reserved list even on premium foils, out comes Reverberate. Functional reprints is their only way to support eternal, and they can't make a functional reprint of original duals on new sets. So I have reason to believe this is the time to get the new dual lands out.

[ramanujan]

There is no way that they will reprint any functional equivilent duals. I wish that people would learn to deal with this issue. It is sad that some people pretty much expect for Duals of some kind which are similar in playability to originals will see print. Let it go. If it happens, then react. The same goes for the Really Extended format. I expect to see about 3-5 legacy playable cards from the 51. I will be pleased with that but not dissapointed if it is zero.

If I had to guess, I would say one sorcery burn spell (R1 deal 5 to any player or legend), one Legend tutor (WW, search your library for target legend and put it in hand), and one land (Enchantment Ruins). I am pretty excited though.

Peace

[bloodbrother]

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/finance/21202_Ten_Predictions_For_Magic_In_2011_And_Beyond_Part_1.html

This. See prediction #1 and #2.

[ramanujan]

Look,

There is no way that Wizards would butcher the Commander decks by loading them with dual land equivalents. The release is about Wizards acceptance of the format and the promotion of Commander oriented cards. Commander cards need to be more powerful than typical standard cards in order to be good enough to play in Commander. Yes, I believe that there will be a few Legacy goodies. No, I do not think that Wizards will give away hundreds of dollars in value in these decks in the form of Duals.

I know that Ben has predicted certain things. I read the article when it came out. However, realize that he has something to gain by saying the things he does. Replace the cap you have on with the thinking one. If we give credibility to his prediction that duals will see print in some form, players are more willing to invest in the other format staples (They are also more willing to wine about duals), which increases the sales volume and price for those staples, causing profits to increase. Similarly, by hanging on to the Over-Extended format rumor the cards that are out of Extended and are not Legacy playable get inflated beyond their fair value. Rav duals are pretty much only useful in Commander yet they are not a couple bucks because there are people willing to bet that Ben and his fellow believers are right. When Starcitygames is able to sell essentially worthless cards for money based on a rumor like Over-Extended they smile from ear to ear.

This release will be about Commander, not Legacy or Vintage. We will get a few new toys, but don’t assume that these cards were printed to sneak under the restricted list.

Peace