Editorial Section:
Every MTGO player knows this time... it's void between MTGO and MTG Paper set releases. As it stands, there's a full week between this article and the pre-release events start. This makes the most popular perennial formats, Standard and Block, obsolete with no changes until the 19th of February. And even then, the changes will be slow and incomplete due to the cards being limited to the pre-release events which don't dump an amazing amount of product into the system in the first weekend.
So what's a player to do in interim? I know the feeling all too well... listless, restless, and distracted by the all new shiny cards in the paper world. It's almost depressing to know that there is another week of wait to even get a taste of these cards. This is generally the time that I start to test and tweak and try to break other formats. The cool thing is that thanks to WotC's efforts in the constructed events arena, there are some new items to play around with, and there are also some pretty sweet player run events as well. Many of them are unsung formats of MTGO, having had little to no exposure of their own. I'd like to take a little time and cover the current off-shoot formats and point out where you all can find more information if you're interested in a new format to keep you busy for the week!
Official Formats:
Commander -
Commander is MTGO's version of EDH. Having played some EDH lately I have to admit how much I really wish MTGO had decent chatting and/or voice chatting built into the client. Sigh. The rules are too complex for simple bullet points, but the general outline can be found here. The key selling points of EDH/Commander are that it's hugely varying between games and is a gigantic free-for-all while playing. All good things.
100 Card Singleton-
The one on one version of Commander/EDH. Tarmotog gives great details into this format whenever he writes about it. There are some major differences between the Commander and 100CS format though, namely the lack of a General and lack of color restrictions whilst building the deck itself. It has a lot of the variance of the EDH/Commander style decks without the need for multiplayer and the restrictions of general based building.
Standard Singleton-
Like a toned down 100 Card Singleton, and without the insanity of the Classic card pool. Standard singleton offers some very nice variation from the typical Standard decks while at the same time allowing you to reuse some of the invested value of your Standard collection, which helps ease the pain of jumping into the format from the ground up.
Unofficial Formats:
Rainbow Stairwell -
This format had its hay-day about three years ago but it still kicks around paper and MTGO from time to time. The premise is as follows:
- One card of each mana cost of one through six for each color
- One artifact of each mana cost of one through six
- Four basic lands of each type
- One "mana fixing" cycle of lands that match
- No hybrid
- No "x" spells (like Blaze or Stream of Life... if you wanted to run that...)
This is perhaps one of the more difficult to build around formats around. However, there are some pretty obvious cards at certain colors... like All Suns' Dawn for example. I highly recommend trying this format for a few days as the games are very dynamic and very fun.
Prismatic-
Once an official format, this former Juggernaut has fallen far from its former glory. A victim of troubled software, troubled banned and restricted lists, and troubling price barriers Prismatic hasn't really seen a huge population for a good long while. The basic premise is as follows:
- Minimum 250 card decklist
- Minimum 20 cards of each color
Those restrictions probably don't seem very harsh, and you'd be right. After multiple multicolored sets, hybrid mana, fetchlands and the original duels... there's almost no challenge to making a coherent, fast, dangerous Prismatic deck. Which is sad, since in its time it was a challenging format that forced some complex deck building decisions.
Harem-
I've never played this one myself, but I thought I'd through it out there just for completeness. I first heard about this format in 2007 after GP: Colorado. The rules are as follows:
- One male character
- All non-lands must feature females in the art
- - or -
- Be a female character
The "flavor" is that the male character is in control of the "harem" of females... chauvinistic, granted, but certainly a unique spin on the EDH style of theme. I'd probably throw bonus points for featuring male Planeswalker as the male. Or, if you prefer it, you could flip the rules and feature a female lead and a stable of male cards. Whatever you find more interesting.
PRE's -
I've written a lot about PRE's in the past (PRE stands for Player Run Events) and they are a very good way to start to test the competitive waters of any specific formats. The reason they're so good is because they are free to enter but (generally) provide prizes which makes people take them at least somewhat seriously in an attempt to win said prizes. PRE's are as numerous as one can imagine with many, many variations and user created formats to choose from. A small sampling of event types are: EDH, Standard Pauper, Peasant, Build your own Standard, and many more... You can check the listings and ask questions here.
Discussion Items:
Help MTGO beat MTGP!!!
Thos smarmy MTGP players have been outnumbering us by about 10 people forever. I'd love to put them in their place for a while with a little help from my fellow MTGO players! It's simple, just join the MTGO group on the WotC boards.
Beware of dealing outside the system:
I hate linking stories like this one, but feel that I really need to (and probably should every month...) to help protect new MTGO members or members new to trading. Any transactions done outside of the system is a huge risk of being scammed. Please, please, please use caution when dealing outside of the system... if you even do it at all.
June 20th? Lifetime MOPR's?
A somewhat cryptic comment from WotC_K hints at *something* coming up this June... which is right around the time of MTGO's birthday. I'm already intrigued, that's for sure!
Foil Alara Block Booster Impacts:
The impacts of the Foil Alara Block boosters has been pretty profound. The resale value of the cards has plummeted and the cards themselves are looking to drop even further as the foil boosters get awarded and opened. This may be a good time to collect a set of the Alara Block cards that you'd like for any eternal formats you play.
Card Price Discussion:
Wow!! What a crazy week for prices! If I had to guess (and who doesn't like guessing?) there's currently a surge of speculation for Legacy singles with the upcoming Legacy Online format. A lot of this week's movement are cards that are in Tempest Block Constructed or Legacy staples.
As for cards moving downwards, it's time to see Kabira Evangel moving down after spiking around .7 tix or so. He jumped up to .7 with some speculation buying but now he seems to be settling back down with more people cracking packs from events and dumping more into the system.
Card Price Charts:
city of traitors chart
undiscovered paradise chart
survival of the fittest chart
force of will chart
underground sea chart
tropical island chart
bayou chart
natural order chart
sphere of resistance chart
manabond chart
conflux chart
wrath of god chart
manabarbs chart
dream halls chart
cataclysm chart
the tabernacle at pendrell vale chart
sphere of resistance chart
rude awakening chart
seismic assault chart
oracle of mul daya chart
rancor chart
engineered explosives chart
hallowed fountain chart
elspeth, knight_errant chart
steam vents chart
sorin markov chart
seal of cleansing chart
the rack chart
snuff out chart
tezzeret the seeker chart
rancor chart
kabira evangel chart
mycoid shepherd chart
hellkite overlord chart
mayael the anima chart
felidar sovereign chart
the rack chart
bituminous blast chart
wall of denial chart
malakir bloodwitch chart
Card Price Graphs:
Conclusion:
By this time next week Worldwake will be in the MTGO store and should have some events dumping packs into the system. From what I've seen and heard, Worldwake sealed is a pretty awesome format for sealed. Hopefully everyone has a chance to enjoy them!
22 Comments
Also worldwake has a high average value per pack since the # of chase rares is extremely high for a small set.
I think that's the opposite of true. Aside from Jace at Mythic, WW is pretty bad for money rares.
and jace is being wayway overvalued right now too. I doubt there will be any cards in worldwake worth more than $15 in paper or online. With no more than 3 being 10 or more. Not for the first month its out of course, but once the prices stabilize, the set is gonna be mostly junk.
Which is good news for those who play constructed and want to play with the cards casually. The bad news being the commons/uncommons that are decent will be higher cost than their zen analogs which are dirt cheap.
Darn it Hammy, have you just been sitting around with your feet up all week? :-)
it's heyday, not hay-day.
heh.
finally word on lifetime points, however now i dont feel my 5,000 points is anything close to a lot of people. oy! what are you doing to me wotc!
being a huge fan of prismatic I'm not sure I'd go as far as to say that there's no challenge to it... sure the land base of any prismatic is a no brainer after 4x fetchs and 4x duals, but go beyond that and there is a bit of a challenge to fit cards down to the 250 min.. and if that's not challenging enough there are always several players, like myself, who play prismatic singleton, which adds more of a twist to it
Oh man...i plan my weekends using the events calendar you post on fridays...i feel like such a loser for saying that, but my wife works weekends so there! :-) Anyway, hopefully it'll be back next week for our viewing enjoyment.
Can anyone explain why Wizards has chosen to have a lag between the release of new sets on paper and then online? Why don't they just release the new sets simultaneously between the paper and online worlds?
It would lower the amount of people who drive to show up to paper pre-releases, and paper is Magic's primary market
Actually it's because they don't start Beta testing the set online until it is released (ok, pre-released) on paper. They would have to spoil all the cards online to do Beta testing any earlier.
Why the jump for Conflux (the card)?
There's a Conflux/Dream Halls deck that's coming together in (paper) Legacy, where you resolve Dream Halls, cast your first Conflux off of any spell in your hand, and then start chaining together Confluxes along with various win conditions -- e.g., Conflux for Conflux, FoW, Hellkite, and Cruel Ultimatum or the like. I suspect the spike in Conflux comes from people putting it together online to play with.
Thank you.
When and why did Baneslayer Angel slip down to 42?
She has fallen out of favor in extended due to the rise of DD/Foundry - and everybody being prepared for her. Unless a "big Zoo" deck does well this weekend she will continue to slide a bit. People are also continuing to draft M10 until WWK comes online due to its high money mythics so increasing supply is meeting decreasing demand in the middle.
Is there a website where I can get a look at more price charts of other cards?
howcome progenitus is 9? where is it used part from marginal hypergenesis?
hmmmm, let's see a) you have to factor in the casual market, b) dont forget classic where progenitus sees play in both dream halls and oath oh and its mythic so automatic money there
not to mention that, like Conflux, it's used in a number of Legacy decks
If you're interested in wacky deckbuilding formats check out our new Build Your Own Standard PRE on Sunday 12:30 PM est in /join BYOS. Click the link Hammy provided for more information on the event.
Here's hoping Rancor drops more so I can pick em up :P.