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By: one million words, Pete Jahn
Jan 30 2015 4:00pm
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State of the Penguin for January 30th 2015

 In the News:

Fate Reforged Prerelease and Release Info Up: Wizards has posted info on the Fate Reforged Release and Prerelease events. The initial posting said release event drafts would be $10, but that was quickly changed to $15. The posting appears to have some additional typos: for instance the payout of a four round, 16 player friendly prerelease event is listed as 3 match wins = 5 FRF packs, 2 match wins = 3 FRF boosters, 2 or 1 match win = 2 FRF boosters. All prerelease drafts will be FRF / KTK / KTK. Sealed events will include a clan-specific booster (with a foil rare or Mythic), 4 FRF boosters and a KTK booster. Triple FRF drafts will be available during the release events. Details here.       
 
Vintage Super League Returns: The VSL has resumed. The league will feature 10 strong players: 4 Hall of Famers, 2 Platinum Pros and several Vintage stalwarts. The League will have 9 rounds of round-robin play, followed by a playoff. The VSL is probably the biggest Vintage “event” outside of the Vintage Champs and the Bazaar of Moxen, so it’s worth a look. The announcement is here. The VSL home page is here.  The first week’s matches were incredible – watch them. 
 
Prize Payouts Updated: Large events (MOCS and PTQ Finals and Prelims) will now start paying out in one third FRF, two thirds Khans. In effect, this means that prize packs will be handed out in draft sets.  
 
Pro Tour Washington DC Next Week: The Pro Tour starts late next week. Wizards will be providing both web and video coverage. The format will be Modern. Details here.
 

The Timeline:

This is a list of things we have been promised, or just want to see coming back.   Another good source for dates and times is the MTGO calendar. Here’s what we know, want or are tracking. This list is getting short mainly because Wizards is so bad at passing on any information about future products or events. They generally have announced these events a day or two before they happens, which means most players never hear about them, and news compilations (like State of the Program) only hear about them too late for them to be included.
 
Item: date and notes
·         Fate Reforged Prerelease: February 2nd release, prereleases Jan. 30th - Feb. 2nd.
·         Fate Reforged Release Events: February 2nd release, prereleases Jan. 30th - Feb. 2nd.
·         Sealed PTQ Prelims: Thurs. Fri. & Sat.
·         Standard PTQ Finals: Sunday, 7am Pacific
·         MOCS Season 2: Champs 7am Pacific, Feb. 14th. Prelims. Feb. 11th-13th
·         Leagues (June 2015?) Wizards said leagues will return in 2015.
·         Modern Masters II: May, 29, 2015. Mirrodin through Scars of Mirrodin. Details here.
 

The Bug Blog Update:

The Bug Blog and Known Issues List is a weekly post by Wizards covering the most common known issues in MTGO. The Known Issues list is here. This week’s update reportedly included several fixes, including Ponder and the bug that says “X won the game, Y won the match.” Note that this is at least the second time that bug is supposed to have been fixed. Most importantly, FRF cards are now online and the new B&R list has been implemented.  
 

Fate Reforged PreRelease and Release Events Survival Guide:

I want to give you a quick overview of Fate Reforged, covering both the money cards you want to open and the common tricks to watch out for.   This overview will be short, since I’m assuming most of you are familiar with Khans limited. The Prerelease events will be a mix Khans and Fate Reforged – more FRF than in more normal sealed events, but still a mix. Details are here.
 
The Money Cards: The prize support in the prerelease is not exceptional, but prices for chase cards are high. Reselling your rares is probably worth considering. With that in mind, here are the chase cards so far. (Note: as I write this, MTGOTraders.com has not posted prices for FRF, so I am pulling the rankings and prices off various paper sites.)
 

Card
Rarity
Paper Price Range
M
$35
M
$25-$30
M
$16-$25
M
$7-$10
R
$10
M
$10
M
$8-$10
R
$6-$7
M
$5-$6

It’s too early to tell what the online prices will be, but it is a pretty certain that you don’t want to pass any of these. 
 
Passing is relevant, because the prerelease events will include drafts. The drafts will be Swiss, FRF/KTK/KTK and cost 15 TIX. There is no TIX plus product option. Prizes for the drafts will be 2 FRF boosters, 2 KTK boosters and a QP for 3-0, 1 FRF and 1 KTK booster for 2-1 and one Khans booster for 1-2. Not super exciting, but if you want to draft FRF, that’s the only option during the prerelease. 
 
The Prereleases will include two flavors of four round sealed events. Both flavors require you to purchase a $5 “battle” prerelease object, which is a clan-specific seeded booster. The entry fee is 20 TIX plus the battle object. The events are 16 player fire on demand events which differ only in the payout.
 

Record
“Friendly” Prerelease Prizes
“Competitive” Prerelease Prizes
4-0
5 FRF boosters
11 FRF boosters & 3 QPs
3-1
3 FRF boosters
5 FRF boosters & 1 QP
2-2
2 FRF boosters
1 FRF booster
1-3
2 FRF boosters
-
No wins
-
-

What to Watch Out for: In addition to all the Khans cards you probably already know to play around, Fate Reforged offers some new mechanics and a few new combat tricks and instant speed removal to worry about. On the plus side, the mechanics are pretty straightforward, especially on MTGO. 
·         Bolster puts counters on your creature with the lowest toughness. This does not target, so you cannot fizzle the effect by killing the lowest toughness creature a player has – you would have to kill all his/her creatures.
·         Manifest puts cards into play as if they were morphs. Their controller can turn them face up if they are creatures by paying their mana cost, or morph cost if they have one. Lands or spells can become manifest creatures, but cannot be turned face up. They can be bounced and used and spells, lands, etc., and non-creature permanents could be Flickered, in which case they would return to the battlefield face up. Note that some effects can put manifest creatures into play (face down) at instant speed.
·         Dash allows you to play a creature more cheaply. The creature gets haste, but returns to your hand at end of turn if it is still in play at that point.
 
You should also be aware of the instants which will be fairly widely played.  Here’s the Cliff Notes version:  
 
   
 
Release Events: The prerelease events run through Monday morning, at which point the release events will begin. The release events will feature the normal mix of drafts, plus a triple FRF 4-3-2-2 queue. Wizards will also be offering 16 player fire on demand queues for 26 TIX, in both “friendly” and “competitive” flavors. Players in these events will get 3 packs of FRF and 3 packs of Khans. As in the prerelease, the only difference is in the prize payout.
 

Record
“Friendly” Release Prizes
“Competitive” Release Prizes
4-0
9 FRF boosters
12 FRF boosters & 3 QPs
3-1
6 FRF boosters
9 FRF boosters & 1 QP
2-2
4 FRF boosters
3 FRF booster
1-3
2 FRF boosters
-
No wins
1 FRF booster
-

Wizards will also offer 64 player single elimination drafts with the eight finalists drafting a second time.   The cost on this is 20 TIX or product plus 8 tix, with prize packs to everyone not eliminate in the very first round.   These run every two hours in the scheduled events room. Finally, Wizards will offer large sealed events with a Top 8 draft periodically in the Scheduled Events room. Cost is 30 TIX. The event’s sealed pool consists of 3 KTK and 3 FRF boosters. Prizes stretch down to 32nd place.
 
Random MTGO Suggestion of the Day: The default for cards drawn off Diminishing Returns should be seven cards, not zero. Right now, if a player clicks “okay” when an opponent casts Diminishing Returns, the player’s new hand will be empty. The player has to manually up the counter to seven cards. While in certain situations, a player might wish to draw less than seven cards, those situations are rare. The default should be to the most likely outcome, not least likely.  Note: I submitted this suggestion to magiconlinefeedback@wizards.com. If you have recommendations or advice, send them there. Wizards does read them.     
 

Cutting Edge Tech:

Standard: We had two large Standard events last weekend.  The first was the Sunday Series finals, held at Wizards HQ. Qualifiers for the Sunday Super Series were held on Sundays at GPs. The Sunday Series finals, however, was a mixed format event, meaning that the winners win was only partly because of his Standard deck. A stronger test for Standard decks came in the two day, 14 round SCG Standard Open in Washington. That event featured a ton of FRF cards. The Top 64 decks are here.
 
 
Modern: The Pro Tour is fast approaching, and it is Modern. As a result, a lot of the best tech is being kept under wraps. Still, SCG ran a Modern IQ last weekend, and a ton of non-qualified players showed up. We got to see what the post-Treasure Cruise, post-Pod meta looks like. The winning deck was something pretty familiar.
 
 
Legacy: SCG held a Super IQ last weekend. It was the first big event without Treasure Cruise and the format looks better and wider. As you would expect, a lot of traditional decks appeared while FRF cards were few and far between. That is not too surprising. It takes some time and practice to master a Legacy deck and learn how to play it against the metagame. Two days after the set is released is barely enough time to scrounge up cards, much less learn a new deck. That said, the Top 32 Legacy decks made a new and interesting mix. The most successful deck, overall, was probably Shardless Sultai, but several other old favorites showed up. Even the Delver decks were the old Canadian Thresh builds.
 
 
Vintage: The Vintage Super League has begun. Season two started on Tuesday night, and Randy Buehler has won two matches in round one, and Chris Pikula won his match with the same deck. Yes, that should be impossible, but Kai Budde had Internet issues, so Randy played LSV in what should have been a round three match.   Randy’s performance was insane – he won a couple long games through a lot of hate, and won on his turn one after being Thoughtseized. Pretty amazing – you should totally go watch the videos. Especially the first game between Chris Pikula and Tom Martell, in which Tom almost gets a turn two kill, only to have Chris get a turn two kill, then win game three through a lot of hate including a turn one Leyline of Sanctity. Just awesome matches.
 
 

Card Prices

Note: all my prices come from the fine folks at MTGOTraders.com. These are retail prices, and generally the price of the lowest priced, actively traded version. (Prices for some rare promo versions are not updated when not in stock, so I skip those.)   You can get these cards at MTGOTraders.com web store, or from their bots: MTGOTradersBot(#) (they have bots 1-10), CardCaddy and CardWareHouse, or sell cards to MTGOTradersBuyBot(#) (they have buybots 1-4). I have bought cards from MTGOTraders for almost a decade now, and have never been overcharged or disappointed.
 
Standard staples: Standard prices dropped hard this week. Not too surprising – prices always drop as everyone sells everything they don’t think will be good when the new set arrives. Most of those people are wrong, so prices will bounce back on many of these cards. 
 

Standard & Block Cards
Price
Last Week
Change
% Change
$9.36
$9.65
($0.29)
-3%
$5.14
$5.52
($0.38)
-7%
$18.92
$19.65
($0.73)
-4%
$10.74
$12.23
($1.49)
-12%
$12.70
$11.79
$0.91
8%
$9.90
$7.93
$1.97
25%
$16.95
$17.97
($1.02)
-6%
$12.34
$15.28
($2.94)
-19%
$9.25
$7.89
$1.36
17%
$8.84
$6.52
$2.32
36%
$13.77
$15.06
($1.29)
-9%
$20.70
$20.47
$0.23
1%
$17.13
$16.80
$0.33
2%
$7.00
$7.88
($0.88)
-11%
$7.86
$7.97
($0.11)
-1%
$10.83
$11.12
($0.29)
-3%
$13.96
$13.60
$0.36
3%
$6.58
$6.62
($0.04)
-1%
$16.58
$15.52
$1.06
7%
$11.15
$11.97
($0.82)
-7%

Modern staples:  Modern prices are clearly showing the effects of the B&R changes. Birthing Pod and the cards that were played mainly in the Pod decks are down. Goyf, Dark Confidant and Liliana are coming back strong. And Karn is riding high after both winning a big event and seeing its major rivals fall to the ban hammer. 
 

Modern Cards
Price
Last Week
Change
% Change
$40.10
$37.44
$2.66
7%
$6.85
$9.84
($2.99)
-30%
$19.95
$18.90
$1.05
6%
$12.87
$12.46
$0.41
3%
$9.55
$9.55
$0.00
0%
$7.25
$8.84
($1.59)
-18%
$24.21
$21.94
$2.27
10%
$28.11
$27.16
$0.95
3%
$17.63
$14.90
$2.73
18%
$28.69
$25.98
$2.71
10%
$53.30
$52.15
$1.15
2%
$42.71
$39.03
$3.68
9%
$94.63
$91.06
$3.57
4%
$23.06
$25.59
($2.53)
-10%
$51.15
$45.09
$6.06
13%
$21.84
$29.72
($7.88)
-27%
$30.51
$27.58
$2.93
11%
$26.45
$31.28
($4.83)
-15%
$28.51
$28.51
$0.00
0%
$18.25
$17.28
$0.97
6%
$95.13
$81.79
$13.34
16%
$23.09
$19.43
$3.66
19%
$39.33
$37.43
$1.90
5%
$14.85
$23.28
($8.43)
-36%

Legacy / Vintage staples: Legacy and Vintage prices were very quiet this week.  
 

Legacy / Vintage Cards
Price
Last Week
Change
% Change
$58.20
$58.20
$0.00
0%
$153.66
$153.66
$0.00
0%
$36.39
$37.03
($0.64)
-2%
$33.10
$30.73
$2.37
8%
$29.86
$29.86
$0.00
0%
$29.76
$30.19
($0.43)
-1%
$10.70
$11.19
($0.49)
-4%
$33.56
$36.81
($3.25)
-9%
$27.28
$27.28
$0.00
0%
$26.22
$26.22
$0.00
0%
$27.44
$27.44
$0.00
0%
$16.78
$17.12
($0.34)
-2%
$13.59
$13.59
$0.00
0%
$112.42
$112.42
$0.00
0%
$51.38
$51.38
$0.00
0%
$81.34
$81.34
$0.00
0%
$148.15
$148.15
$0.00
0%
$44.51
$44.51
$0.00
0%
$29.99
$29.99
$0.00
0%
$49.38
$49.38
$0.00
0%
$26.05
$27.61
($1.56)
-6%
$18.23
$18.23
$0.00
0%
$32.31
$32.31
$0.00
0%
$106.54
$101.61
$4.93
5%

Set Redemption: You can redeem complete sets on MTGO. You need to purchase a redemption voucher from the store for $25. During the next downtime, Wizards removes a complete set from your account, and sends you the same set in paper.   For those of you who redeem, here are the retail prices of one of everything set currently available in the store, excluding sets that are not currently draftable or not redeemable.    
 

Complete Set
Price
Last Week
Change
% Change
Born of the Gods
$70.84
$69.38
$1.46
2%
Fate Reforged
next
week
Journey into Nix
$109.26
$108.13
$1.13
1%
Khans of Trakir
$92.44
$96.26
($3.82)
-4%
M15
$144.89
$146.10
($1.21)
-1%
Theros
$105.94
$106.68
($0.74)
-1%

The Good Stuff:

The following is a list of all the non-promo, non-foil cards on MTGO that retail for more than $25 per card.  These are the big ticket items in the world of MTGO. The list looks pretty much like last week’s, except that Goyf, Liliana and the Modern staples have climbed again.
 

Name
Rarity
Set
Price
Black Lotus
B
VMA
$ 153.66
Rishadan Port
R
MM
$ 148.15
Misdirection
R
MM
$ 112.42
Wasteland
U
TE
$ 106.54
Tarmogoyf
R
FUT
$   97.99
Tarmogoyf
M
MMA
$   95.13
Liliana of the Veil
M
ISD
$   94.63
Mox Sapphire
B
VMA
$   81.34
Ancestral Recall
B
VMA
$   58.20
Force of Will
R
MED
$   55.59
Griselbrand
M
AVR
$   53.30
Mox Jet
B
VMA
$   51.38
Infernal Tutor
R
DIS
$   51.34
Mox Opal
M
SOM
$   51.15
Time Walk
B
VMA
$   49.38
Mox Ruby
B
VMA
$   48.32
Show and Tell
R
UZ
$   44.51
Karn Liberated
M
NPH
$   42.71
Vendilion Clique
R
MOR
$   40.91
Batterskull
M
NPH
$   40.10
Vendilion Clique
M
MMA
$   39.33
City of Traitors
R
EX
$   36.39
Tangle Wire
R
NE
$   34.82
Mox Emerald
B
VMA
$   33.92
Force of Will
R
VMA
$   33.56
Containment Priest
R
C14
$   33.10
Mox Pearl
B
VMA
$   32.57
Undiscovered Paradise
R
VI
$   32.31
Toxic Deluge
R
C13
$   32.19
Volcanic Island
R
ME4
$   31.18
Daze
C
DD2
$   30.97
Primeval Titan
M
M11
$   30.55
Primeval Titan
M
M12
$   30.51
Sneak Attack
R
UZ
$   29.99
Dark Depths
R
CSP
$   29.86
Volcanic Island
R
ME3
$   29.78
Daze
C
NE
$   29.76
Dark Confidant
R
RAV
$   29.53
Fulminator Mage
R
SHM
$   28.69
Scapeshift
R
MOR
$   28.51
Auriok Champion
R
5DN
$   28.31
Dark Confidant
M
MMA
$   28.11
Intuition
R
TE
$   27.44
Gaea's Cradle
R
UZ
$   27.28
Scalding Tarn
R
ZEN
$   26.45
Hurkyl's Recall
R
10E
$   26.22
True-Name Nemesis
R
C13
$   26.05
Cryptic Command
R
LRW
$   25.23

The big number is the retail price of a playset (4 copies) of every card available on MTGO. Assuming you bought the least expensive version available, the cost of owning a playset of every card on MTGO you can own is $ 26,010. That’s up about $200 from where we were last week, and the total does not yet include Fate Reforged.
 

Weekly Highlights:

I spent a lot of time on work and various non-magic related stuff last week, but managed to squeeze in some Legacy Cube drafts. I went 2-1 repeatedly in Swiss matches, which means I have exactly the same number of Phantom Points I started with. Playing endless drafts for free is kinda cool, even if I don’t get any cards. I’m still not interested in entering a Khans or Theros Phantom event, but Cube is good times. 
 
PRJ
 
“One Million Words” and “3MWords” on MTGO
 
 
This series is an ongoing tribute to Erik “Hamtastic” Friborg.
 
HammyBot Still Running: HammyBot was set up to sell off Erik Friborg’s collection, with all proceeds going to his wife and son. So far, HammyBot has raised over $8,000, but there are a lot of cards left in the collection. Those cards are being sold at 10% below retail price. Erik died three years ago, so HammyBot does not include any standard legal cards, but it includes a ton of Masters Edition and Vintage cards, and some nice Modern bargains. 

 

13 Comments

Sooo by howlett23 at Sun, 02/01/2015 - 00:37
howlett23's picture

No one is gonna mention the "Penguin"....hmmm...guess I will then.

Nobody mention it? We all by longtimegone at Sun, 02/01/2015 - 16:20
longtimegone's picture

Nobody mention it? We all just read 3,788 words on the state of the penguin, what else is there to say?

yeah, but nobody mentioned it by howlett23 at Sun, 02/01/2015 - 18:38
howlett23's picture

.

What Penguin? *shifty eyed by JXClaytor at Sun, 02/01/2015 - 19:13
JXClaytor's picture

What Penguin? *shifty eyed glances*

anyone else smell by howlett23 at Sun, 02/01/2015 - 21:38
howlett23's picture
5

an "on the take" proofreader....what was the promised price Grima?

Pete writes this column by JXClaytor at Sun, 02/01/2015 - 22:48
JXClaytor's picture

Pete writes this column weekly and does an outstanding job, sometimes it is dry, I mean prices and stuff. We used to move Jace, the Mindsculptor from Worldwake to other sets in those price lists.

We have fun sometimes!

Oh I love the column by howlett23 at Mon, 02/02/2015 - 16:28
howlett23's picture
5

Believe me, even though I haven't played MTGO in many many months, I still get on here to read it Friday. I am extremely grateful he continued this column after Hammy. I just thought it was some tribute to Whiffy perhaps his birthday or something. Obviously my time away has taken me "out of the know".

Release Events by Dwarven_Pony at Mon, 02/02/2015 - 19:14
Dwarven_Pony's picture
5

Thanks Pete for this article.

May I ask, do you consider Release Events to be good EV?

Yes by one million words at Mon, 02/02/2015 - 21:34
one million words's picture

I like the release events. The prize support is reasonable and the only real downside is not being able to pay in packs. That's not much of a problem, since I generally don't have many packs that early anyway.

The prerelease events are not good value - but I did play in two. I look at it as paying a premium to play with the new set right away.

I like the events, but I by Joe Fiorini at Tue, 02/03/2015 - 18:03
Joe Fiorini's picture

I like the events, but I still haven't done any this time. My time is very limited, so I'm playing less limited :). Just been jamming legacy at every opportunity.

i didn't get the penguin by Joe Fiorini at Mon, 02/02/2015 - 21:28
Joe Fiorini's picture
5

i didn't get the penguin thing until you guys mentioned it and I went back and noticed it. I hope he's a happy bird.

My work by howlett23 at Tue, 02/03/2015 - 13:03
howlett23's picture

here is done then. One person who didn't notice now does. Thank you sir. :-D

EV by Dwarven_Pony at Tue, 02/03/2015 - 07:45
Dwarven_Pony's picture
5

Thanks Pete, I like your feedback about the Release vs Pre-Release events.