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It stacks.


Thats awesome, I was hoping so. I've got this pretty nice vampire deck going right now and I;m hoping I could get some help maybe tweaking it?

24 Creatures
4 Blood Seeker
4 Falkenrath Noble
1 Butcher of Malakir
1 Bloodlord of Vaasgoth
1 Chosen of Markov
4 Bloodrage Vampire
2 Child of Night
1 Bloodline Keeper
1 Milkaeus the Unhallowed
1 Rune Scarred Demon
1 Quag Vampires
1 Typhoid Rats
1 Gatekeeper of Malakir
1 Blood Artist

19 Non Creature Spells
1 Taste of Blood
1 Gath' Verdict
1 Disentomb
1 Skeletal Grimace
2 Dark Ritual
1 Dark Banishing
2 Doom Blade
1 Go for the Throat
1 Tragic Slip
2 Dismember
1 Deadly Allure
1 Sorin's Vengeance
1 Killing Wave
2 Sorin's Thirst
1 No Mercy

6 Artifacts
1 Isolation Cell
1 Trepanation Blade
1 Lashwrithe
1 Onyx Goblet
2 Demon's Horn

3 Planeswalkers
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
1 Liliana of the Veil

25 Lands
19 Swamps
2 Plains
1 Shimmering Grotto
1 Haunted Fengraf
2 Evolving Winds

The Bloodline Keeper + Bloodlord of Vaasgoth + Sorin is really really wonderful.. destroyed my roommate tonight who kept using Sunbeam Spellbomb to delay the game haha

Edit: I'm thinking of getting rid of Liliana as she really doesn't add much to the deck.. idk
 
Thats awesome, I was hoping so. I've got this pretty nice vampire deck going right now and I;m hoping I could get some help maybe tweaking it?
The Bloodline Keeper + Bloodlord of Vaasgoth + Sorin is really really wonderful.. destroyed my roommate tonight who kept using Sunbeam Spellbomb to delay the game haha

Edit: I'm thinking of getting rid of Liliana as she really doesn't add much to the deck.. idk[/QUOTE]

General tips:

Most decks are 60 cards exactly. The reason for this is draw consistency. A deck will work much better if you are able to consistently draw what you need. By limiting yourself to the minimum allowed deck size, you are maximizing on the chance you draw what you need. Another point for consistency would be running multiples of the core cards of your deck.

For land, a rule of thumb would be to make 40% of your deck be lands. In this case, 77 cards would need 30-31 lands. Since your deck seems to be filled with relatively low costing cards, it should be okay with that many lands

So for the deck itself:

I would highly recommending cutting down to 60 cards. The next question will be to ask yourself what your deck is trying to do. Will it be a creature based deck that will win games by having creatures do damage, or will it be a spell based deck that will kill off your opponents creatures and stall the game long enough for you to drop your expensive mega card or combo?

Once you have answered that question, it will make it much easier to trim down your deck. You go down the list of cards and ask yourself what it is doing to contribute to the playstyle that your deck is and whether or not its effects are feasible enough to pull off in a normal game. Suppose you have a killer combo with, Bloodline Keeper, Bloodlord of Vaasgoth and Sorin. It may be cool and game-winning, but you have to consider the likelyhood of drawing those three specific cards in the game and surviving long enough to put them out onto the battlefield. This goes back to the point about consistency. A lot of the time, the best decks out there rely on an okay-powered combo, but they're good because they are able to pull it off almost every single game.

So since I don't know what playstyle you'd like to play, I'll just highlight all the good/bad cards (bad as in bad in general) and a reason why.

4 Blood Seeker - good, especially if your opponent is playing a creature-based deck

4 Falkenrath Noble - also good against creature-based decks and possibly good for your own deck if you have a combo where you kill your own creatures. avoid running too many due to his relatively high cost

1 Butcher of Malakir - bad. This may be okay if you're running a very creature-heavy deck or running a deck that runs tokens, but more often than not you'll be sacrificing a creature that you would rather have not lost. Also, your opponent gets to choose which creature he loses, so it may not get rid of any threats if they have more than one creature. 7 mana is too expensive for what he is. Even if you get him out, he doesn't do anything too great.

1 Bloodlord of Vaasgoth - okay. If your deck becomes one that does damage easily (via burn spells, or just straight up aggresive creatives) then he can be very good. Keep him in if you decide to go creature-based.

1 Chosen of Markov - okay/bad. She's a bit slow in that she has to wait 3 turns after she's played in order for her to attack. Not only that, she has to slow down one of your other creatures too! She isn't seen in competitive play because of this.

4 Bloodrage Vampire - okay. keep him along with vaasgoth if you decide to go that route. He is pretty fragile, however.

2 Child of Night - good. Cheap, and lifelink will net you returns even if you decide to use him to block a big monster. 2 more of these will be good for your deck.

1 Bloodline Keeper - great. This guy can win games alone if he survives enough to transform. Creating a 2/2 vampire every turn is NUTS

1 Milkaeus the Unhallowed - great. expensive, but he's one of those ones that does amazing things once he enters. He has good power for his cost, buffs your other vampires, is potentially unblockable and has a bonus if your opponent uses humans.

1 Rune Scarred Demon - okay. he's great since he can find you a card in your deck, but having him in your opening hand is kind of a bummer. He's a useless card for 7 turns essentially.

1 Quag Vampires - good. you can lay him down turn 1 just as a 1/1, or save him up for more power later. Bonus points if your opponent is playing black.

1 Typhoid Rats - good. Laying this card down at any point in the game makes their big bomb creature stop in its tracks. Deathtouch rocks!

1 Gatekeeper of Malakir - good. cheap, and can remove a creature. by turn 3, your opponent shouldn't have too many creatures out and you can use his kicker to destroy more favorable targets. keep in mind that he can actually kill hexproof stuff!

1 Blood Artist - great. this card is awesome. although you may notice that he has the same effect as falkenrath noble, he is much better because he is so cheap. this is a card that you can play by turn 2 and start gaining from his effect nice and early. Having this guy out (or more copies of him out) suddenly makes combat for your opponent a really sucky thing to consider.

19 Non Creature Spells

1 Taste of Blood - bad. yes, it is direct damage, but it really isn't worth taking up space in your hand and deck for.

1 Gath' Verdict - good. cheap, and will take care of hexproof creatures. the -1 to opponent's life is a nice bonus.

1 Disentomb - okay. very situational. drawing this card early kind of sucks because you really want to be using this on your more powerful creatures that died (Mikaeus/Bloodline Keeper). nice to have just in case but don't be afraid to cut it out of your deck.

1 Skeletal Grimace - bad. enchantments are bad because they require another card to work. worse yet, if your enchanted creature dies, this enchantment goes with it. the +1/+1 and regenerate ability is pretty nice though so it isn't entirely bad. just remember that enchantments are inherently inefficient unless they give you gamechanging effects.

2 Dark Ritual - bad. very situational and it only gives you +2 mana. Keep in mind that this card takes up a slot in your hand/deck and you might not have another card ready for you to use at the same time.

1 Dark Banishing - okay/good. just kills a dude and they can't regenerate. a tad bit overcosted, unlike the next card!

2 Doom Blade - great. just kills a dude, and it's great cause it's only 2 mana!

1 Go for the Throat - great. same as above, but it's better because this one can kill creatures of any color including black. there aren't many artifact creatures (unless your opponent is playing an artifact deck), so this one is pretty much a kill anything card.

1 Tragic Slip - great. super cheap, and you can use it after combat to destroy pretty much any creature that isn't bigger than 13.

2 Dismember - great. A lot of creatures are weaker than 5, and being able to pay life instead of mana is a big plus. remember, life isn't as important as you might think. life can be considered "free", especially early in the game where life totals don't really matter.

1 Deadly Allure - okay. This is an inefficient way to kill creatures. you have to essentially sacrifice one of your own to kill theirs. You probably aren't running green mana either, so that part of the card is lost.

1 Sorin's Vengeance - good. if your deck is meant to draw out games, then this card is good. especially when paired with Sorin Markov (unfortunately, not Sorin, Lord of Innistrad) for obvious reasons.

1 Killing Wave - okay. This card is almost a game winner, but it is a very situational thing. The way this card wins games is if you have Blood Artists out on the field. Essentially, the blood artists make it so that they lose a ton of life and you gain a ton. It is a very difficult card to play correctly however. Despite its name, it's more of a burn spell than a kill-everything spell. Definitely a card you might want to think about before using.

2 Sorin's Thirst - much like taste of blood, but costs more for 1 more point of damage. Remember, at 2 mana you can outright kill a creature with Doom Blade/Go for the Throat/Geth's Verdict. The +2 life is usually and mostly irrelevant.

1 No Mercy - great. This is an interesting card that can completely shut off your opponent's ability to do damage to you if they rely on creatures. If they use creatures, keep this in!

6 Artifacts
1 Isolation Cell - okay. a cute way to slow your opponent down and slowly kill him. mind you that 4 mana is kind of costly.

1 Trepanation Blade - probably... okay... this card is geared more towards decks that focus on milling your opponent's deck out (throwing their cards from their deck to the graveyard). You can potentially get ridiculous amounts of power out of it, though, but it is very random.

1 Lashwrithe - great. Since you only have swamps, this will get huge over time. Not to mention that it comes in with a creature! Bonus for having phyrexian mana cost to equip so you can equip in tight situations.

1 Onyx Goblet - bad. Probably too slow at 1 life per round to win you a game. 20 turns in magic is a loooong time. you'll find this card gets in the way in terms of taking up space in your hand and deck.

2 Demon's Horn - bad. lifegain in magic isn't that great (unless it is lifelink or you are running a deck that is built around gaining life). wasting a card just to gain some life isn't as great as you think. You won't be moving yourself closer to victory with more life.

Of course, if you're planning to get competive, then everything that was rated worse than great is a crap card. LOL. Most of my advice was good for casual play, so don't go to your local store and expect results. Even with this advice though, you'd probably destroy your roomate every time.

EDIT: holy crap I wrote a lot.
 
Of course, if you're planning to get competive, then everything that was rated worse than great is a crap card. LOL. Most of my advice was good for casual play, so don't go to your local store and expect results. Even with this advice though, you'd probably destroy your roomate every time.

EDIT: holy crap I wrote a lot.



Wow thanks! I'm definitely keeping it to extremely casual play. Thats a lot of help though, much appreciated!
 
So I went to a pre release event on Sat and did the limited 6 booster pack event. It was my first one but it was a ton of fun. Made 40 card deck of white and green, but was not too lucky with draws, some folks were getting 2 planeswalkers out of 6 packs. Played 4 rounds, best 2 out of 3, went 2-1, 1-2, 1-2, 2-1. So I won a free booster pack and guess what was in it? Sublime Archangel. Exalted seems so dirty with the stacking and all.
 
You know, between the prerelease and DOTP I have really taken a liking to Archaeomancer. It is a shame that Snapcaster turns it into a joke.
 
Did the pre-release on Saturday, out of 20 ended up 10th which for my first event I thought wasn't too bad.

Ended up with two Gilded Lotus (one foil), Yeva, Nature's Herald, Slumbering Dragon, Door to Nothingness (Pointless), Void Stalker, Shimian Specter off the top of head and ran with a W/G deck with a Played 5, Won 2, Lost 2, Drew 1 match.

Quite enjoyed it and now off to the weekly Magic event tonight, slowly learning the ropes and people are helping me out with cards and deck ideas.

Quick question I'm planning a deck and with Rhox Faithmender it doubles any life gained. Can this be stacked if I had multiple out.

Or can it be so if I gain 1 life and have three Rhox out, I would gain 2 for each Rhox?
 
You know, between the prerelease and DOTP I have really taken a liking to Archaeomancer. It is a shame that Snapcaster turns it into a joke.

They serve slightly different purposes in that the spells Archaeomancer brings back are continuously reusable. Combo him with some flicker effects like a conjurers closet and you could give your opponents serious fits.
 
Did the pre-release on Saturday, out of 20 ended up 10th which for my first event I thought wasn't too bad.

Ended up with two Gilded Lotus (one foil), Yeva, Nature's Herald, Slumbering Dragon, Door to Nothingness (Pointless), Void Stalker, Shimian Specter off the top of head and ran with a W/G deck with a Played 5, Won 2, Lost 2, Drew 1 match.

Quite enjoyed it and now off to the weekly Magic event tonight, slowly learning the ropes and people are helping me out with cards and deck ideas.

Quick question I'm planning a deck and with Rhox Faithmender it doubles any life gained. Can this be stacked if I had multiple out.

Or can it be so if I gain 1 life and have three Rhox out, I would gain 2 for each Rhox?

It stacks multiplicatively. So 1x2x2x2 =8
 
I haven't played Legacy for months and am looking to build something on MTGO-I have tons of cards and tix so availability isn't a problem.

Is Goblins playable again? Black splash for maindeck weirding and SB perish and cabal therapy of course. I use to wreck that deck playing Stoneforge Mystic based decks, but SFM is all but gone from the metgame now and it seems as long as you don't die to random Jittes (read: board in your own), it's still a really powerful deck.
 
Any more pre-release stories? I opened a pretty bomby pool; lots of small drops (3x Krenko's Command) along with Odric, Captain of the Watch, and Hellkite (woot!), so naturally I went Boros. I didn't have much in way of removal, only one Searing Lance and a Pacifism, but the weenie rushdown paired with the bombs was good for a 3-1 final record. My last opponent had his way with me; couldn't force through enough damage before he stabilized (lol Duskdale Wurm + Mark of the Vampire, nasty). Another highlight of that match was him murdering Odric and then using Rise from the Grave the next turn and finishing me in one fell swoop. Brutal.

I had a decent time overall. The best part of the tourney for me was probably seeing my friend get off Bolas' ultimate for the win with exactly 1 life remaining. The worst? Opening 27 packs' worth of prizes among the three of us and getting pretty poopy cards. I probably lucked out the best with Chandra and the Merfolk lord, but I was hoping for either another Hellkite or a Thragtusk. Still, I've had far worse luck in the past, and managed to get one of the cards on my wishlist, so I'm pretty happy.

That's all the limited I'll be doing for M13, now I'm counting down the days 'til RTR comes out. Gonna put all my saved $ toward the pre-release/release events for that one. :D
 
My sealed pool for prerelease was pretty bad. My rares were Battle of Wits, Diabolic Revelation, Reverberate, Magmaquake, and Staff of Nin, and some other junk rare. Ended up making this U/R deck that had quite a lot of drawing power (with 3 rummaging goblin lol), one arms dealer for removal, and a few blue fliers.

I went 2-1, 0-2, and 2-0 somehow. I don't know how. A lot of the games were just me drawing through my deck hoping to pick up a non-existant bomb lol. I guess my fliers did it for me with an emergency Magmaquake.

The best thing happened one of my opponents cast Murder, I responded with Reverberate, then a Negate. That was pretty awesome. Another time I did the same thing but with Captain's Call instead. I also pulled off a clutch Searing Spear + Reverberate on a Jace's Phantasm that just managed to get the +4/+4 then swung for lethal.
 
I haven't played Legacy for months and am looking to build something on MTGO-I have tons of cards and tix so availability isn't a problem.

Is Goblins playable again? Black splash for maindeck weirding and SB perish and cabal therapy of course. I use to wreck that deck playing Stoneforge Mystic based decks, but SFM is all but gone from the metgame now and it seems as long as you don't die to random Jittes (read: board in your own), it's still a really powerful deck.

It's not tier 1, but it has had a bit of a resurgence and decent success recently, due in no small part to Cavern of Souls. I'd say go for it.
 
My sealed pool for prerelease was pretty bad. My rares were Battle of Wits, Diabolic Revelation, Reverberate, Magmaquake, and Staff of Nin, and some other junk rare. Ended up making this U/R deck that had quite a lot of drawing power (with 3 rummaging goblin lol), one arms dealer for removal, and a few blue fliers.

But Staff of Nin is awesome for Limited!
 
Yeah last to a Staff of Nin on Sunday in 2HG as well. Card is broken as fuck in limited.

Not as bad as Mind Sculpt in draft. Some guy managed to scoop up about 7 of them and milled everyone out. I got him down to around 3 life both times, but each game he managed to score most of the burn I was packing. >:(
 
I like that Mill definitely seems like it might be a workable archetype in M13 draft. Even just taking a Jace's Phantasm and a Mind Sculpt or two as a side bet seems workable.
 
372974_325573087529157_933670907_n.jpg


Just stumbled upon this image randomly, and thought of you Mtg GAF. lol

Would Arbor Elf really be any more useful for bluffing than a Llanowar? I think most people are pretty used to seeing that one mana elf on your side as a potential mana source. And all other things being equal leaving it untapped is better since it can be a blocker who still gives you mana before combat damage.

I mean, the fact that Arbor Elf can untap any green producing shockland is one of the biggest reasons why he's okay to have in the currents standard over Llanowar Elf. Assuming Shocklands are reprinted.
 
I mean, the fact that Arbor Elf can untap any green producing shockland is one of the biggest reasons why he's okay to have in the currents standard over Llanowar Elf. Assuming Shocklands are reprinted.
Everything about this core set points to, if not the shocklands being reprinted, then some other non-basics that use the standard types being printed. Every ramp card in the set refers to to the lands by the specific name rather than "basic land."
 
Not as bad as Mind Sculpt in draft. Some guy managed to scoop up about 7 of them and milled everyone out. I got him down to around 3 life both times, but each game he managed to score most of the burn I was packing. >:(

Wait, can you actually play more than 4 of a card in draft?
 
If they don't reprint the Shocklands (or an equivalent) they have been doing some masterful trolling these past months.

I couldn't begin to imagine the backlash if the shocklands didn't come back. On the one hand, it'd be kind of hilarious to see the outrage, but then again I (and many others) are counting on RtR to be our ticket to Modern and not having the shocklands would be a huge blow to that and kill a LOT of the hype.
 
But Staff of Nin is awesome for Limited!
Well, the thing is my deck had no big body or win card to draw into. thats why it was a crappy pool. If i had a finisher like thundermaw then it would have been great

Edit: to be clear, i did main deck Staff of Nin. I never drew anything great off of it, but yeah it definitely helped. only showed up in 2 of my games, both of which I lost.
 
Learn something new every day. Thanks.

Ya, otherwise you're disadvantaged for no reason so in anything limited you can do as many as you want. Just like the kid a couple drafts ago I played that had 6 of the black card that if it dies you bring back with something of 3 or less converted mana cost or something. I forget the name now.
 
Ya, otherwise you're disadvantaged for no reason so in anything limited you can do as many as you want. Just like the kid a couple drafts ago I played that had 6 of the black card that if it dies you bring back with something of 3 or less converted mana cost or something. I forget the name now.

Image.ashx
 
Thanks to WanderingWind's incredible generosity, my friend and I have been playing magic very often. He has a really annoying red deck where Uncanny Speed is the most annoying thing ever. I'm thoroughly enjoying my green deck. It takes me a bit longer to get all my creatures out, but it's worth it most of the time if my roomate doesn't finish me first. Green is definitely my play style.. I'm on the prowl for four Wolfir Silverhearts.

We went to our local comic/game shop to buy some basic lands and we overheard a fellow player saying it's worth it to buy a booster box because you usually always get back what you put into it from the valuable cards you find. Well, if that's true, we'd like to buy a booster box so we can find some rares, but also sell some in order to recoup some or all of the cost of the booster box. We're not sure which set to buy. I pretty much have all the commons/most of the uncommons I will ever need from Avacyn Restored because of WanderingWind.

Should we buy a Innistrad (~$91), Dark Ascension (~$97), Avacyn Restored (~$97) booster box or wait a few days to buy a Magic2013 booster box (Not sure of the $)?
 
Should we buy a Innistrad (~$91), Dark Ascension (~$97), Avacyn Restored (~$97) booster box or wait a few days to buy a Magic2013 booster box (Not sure of the $)?

In terms of making your money back I'd say that M13 definitely is not the way to go, almost no chase rares. Avacyn Restored would be my recommendation.
 
You know, between the prerelease and DOTP I have really taken a liking to Archaeomancer. It is a shame that Snapcaster turns it into a joke.

Archaeomancer is my favorite creature in M13 so far, with Disciple of Bolas a close second. Won me 2 games at the prerelease getting back Sleep once and a key Murder the second time.

I mainly play EDH, but am curious to see what M13 cards will see standard play (other than Thragtusk).
 
Dunno if this is good advice,b ut in a week or so, the 2013 Deckbuilder's toolkit comes out with a lot of land, a nice box to keep cards in, some premade mini decks, and several booster packs.
 
Thanks to WanderingWind's incredible generosity, my friend and I have been playing magic very often. He has a really annoying red deck where Uncanny Speed is the most annoying thing ever. I'm thoroughly enjoying my green deck. It takes me a bit longer to get all my creatures out, but it's worth it most of the time if my roomate doesn't finish me first. Green is definitely my play style.. I'm on the prowl for four Wolfir Silverhearts.

We went to our local comic/game shop to buy some basic lands and we overheard a fellow player saying it's worth it to buy a booster box because you usually always get back what you put into it from the valuable cards you find. Well, if that's true, we'd like to buy a booster box so we can find some rares, but also sell some in order to recoup some or all of the cost of the booster box. We're not sure which set to buy. I pretty much have all the commons/most of the uncommons I will ever need from Avacyn Restored because of WanderingWind.

Should we buy a Innistrad (~$91), Dark Ascension (~$97), Avacyn Restored (~$97) booster box or wait a few days to buy a Magic2013 booster box (Not sure of the $)?

From a purely financial view, a box isn't a very smart way to hope to make financial gains or break even. You will almost always come up short in terms of the value of rares that you find.

Still though, booster packs are super fun to open. If you like simply opening them, then go ahead and get a box of them. Remember though, that you shouldn't be doing it for the money. Packs are great for drafting from or playing another limited format, and for some people, the feeling they get from simply opening them is worth the price of admission.

So if you want to play it smart money wise, never buy a single booster pack and buy only single cards. Math that shows you will lose the majority of the time. This is because most rares in a set are junk. Unless you are going to devote a huge chunk of your time trading these junk cards upwards (sometimes this isn't even possible), then you are stuck with rares that will sell for $0.10 a piece in bulk. Average booster pack in a box costs about $2.60 so you're getting back $3.60 if you happen to open all junk in a single box. Add a few bucks for some decent rares and about $20 of mythics, and you're still down about $50-70 dollars per box. Of course, there are times when you get lucky and open an expensive mythic ($30+), but those are few and far between.

If you're like me and many other people, we feel that buying a box and cracking open those packs is super fun, and there is a small chance of opening what we really want. Really though, those money rares are a nice bonus if we happen to get them. Drafting/Sealed/Mini-master are fun in their own way and I think they are worth the price of admission.
 
Except when you're me, and you typically open at least one foil planeswalker per set. :D
/brag.

No but I agree. I don't open boxes for the money, I do it because I love the game and it's fun. But for M13 the value just isn't close to what it generally is, and money is tight now that I'm moving into my own place, so I'll just be buying singles and a few packs here and there.
 
From a purely financial view, a box isn't a very smart way to hope to make financial gains or break even. You will almost always come up short in terms of the value of rares that you find.

Still though, booster packs are super fun to open. If you like simply opening them, then go ahead and get a box of them. Remember though, that you shouldn't be doing it for the money. Packs are great for drafting from or playing another limited format, and for some people, the feeling they get from simply opening them is worth the price of admission.

So if you want to play it smart money wise, never buy a single booster pack and buy only single cards. Math that shows you will lose the majority of the time. This is because most rares in a set are junk. Unless you are going to devote a huge chunk of your time trading these junk cards upwards (sometimes this isn't even possible), then you are stuck with rares that will sell for $0.10 a piece in bulk. Average booster pack in a box costs about $2.60 so you're getting back $3.60 if you happen to open all junk in a single box. Add a few bucks for some decent rares and about $20 of mythics, and you're still down about $50-70 dollars per box. Of course, there are times when you get lucky and open an expensive mythic ($30+), but those are few and far between.

If you're like me and many other people, we feel that buying a box and cracking open those packs is super fun, and there is a small chance of opening what we really want. Really though, those money rares are a nice bonus if we happen to get them. Drafting/Sealed/Mini-master are fun in their own way and I think they are worth the price of admission.

First, I completely agree with the thrill of opening up a pack of cards and not knowing what's inside. It's the main secret reason I want to buy a fat pack or booster box. Since I began playing Magic a few days ago, I started feeling like a kid again. Haha. I want to collect all the cards and have the best deck just like when I was younger playing Pokemon. The recouping of money would have just helped. I'll talk to my roommate and see if he wants to split a fat pack or booster box just to get new cards. If there's no financial reward to be had, then I'd like to go with M13. The cards seem really fun, especially that Thragtusk.
 
Why is it that so many people approach all the Magic product they buy and events they play in from such a stringent expected value perspective? It isn't a flawed way to approach things, but it just seems so much more prevalent and exposed in Magic than in any other hobby. Is it just that it is generally pretty expensive and thus you want to get the most for your money?
 
Thanks to WanderingWind's incredible generosity, my friend and I have been playing magic very often. He has a really annoying red deck where Uncanny Speed is the most annoying thing ever. I'm thoroughly enjoying my green deck. It takes me a bit longer to get all my creatures out, but it's worth it most of the time if my roomate doesn't finish me first. Green is definitely my play style.. I'm on the prowl for four Wolfir Silverhearts.

We went to our local comic/game shop to buy some basic lands and we overheard a fellow player saying it's worth it to buy a booster box because you usually always get back what you put into it from the valuable cards you find. Well, if that's true, we'd like to buy a booster box so we can find some rares, but also sell some in order to recoup some or all of the cost of the booster box. We're not sure which set to buy. I pretty much have all the commons/most of the uncommons I will ever need from Avacyn Restored because of WanderingWind.

Should we buy a Innistrad (~$91), Dark Ascension (~$97), Avacyn Restored (~$97) booster box or wait a few days to buy a Magic2013 booster box (Not sure of the $)?

Out of the ones you listed, Dark Ascension is the only one I wouldn't get. For you, I would recommend M13, since you probably won't need to worry about financial returns, and instead focus on building a decent cardpool for deckbuilding, and this is a good way to get alot of the core spells. You can also potentially build up a nice stock if M10 Dual lands. And while there may not be a lot of chase rares, even pulling one Ajanni, Lilliana, or Thundermaw will likely get you the trading power you need to score things like Thragtusk.

If not M13, then I recommend Innistrad. As others in this thread have pointed out, there are some nice rares in this set. The Garruk you could get is nice, and cards like Lilliana and Snapcaster will likely hold value. The dual lands in this set will also likely appreciate in value.

Good luck with your pulls!
 
Why is it that so many people approach all the Magic product they buy and events they play in from such a stringent expected value perspective? It isn't a flawed way to approach things, but it just seems so much more prevalent and exposed in Magic than in any other hobby. Is it just that it is generally pretty expensive and thus you want to get the most for your money?
Yes, but generally I want to get the most for money in anything and everything I do whether it be grocery shopping, video games, or Magic.

I bought a bunch of cards on eBay:
Strangleroot Geist x4
Titanic Growth x4
Mwonvuli Beast Tracker x4
Sentinel Spider x4
Fog x4
Duskdale Wurm x4
Acidic Slime x4
Moldgraf Monstrosity x4
Fungal Sprouting x4
Revive x4
Soul of the Harvest x4
Bountiful Harvest x4
Wolfir Silverheart x2

Everything was $26.85. Hope I didn't go overboard. Hopefully they're good. Buying singles seems to be the way to go. I get what I want with no uncertainty.
 
Why is it that so many people approach all the Magic product they buy and events they play in from such a stringent expected value perspective? It isn't a flawed way to approach things, but it just seems so much more prevalent and exposed in Magic than in any other hobby. Is it just that it is generally pretty expensive and thus you want to get the most for your money?
I think people generally want perceived fair value for whatever they pay for, but that's particularly true in the case of Magic where people are paying considerably large sums of money for cardboard. I have fun at pre-release events and all, but it's that much more fun when I open a money mythic in my pool or in prize packs, for example. If I don't open any money in both my pool and prize packs, I get a little salty.

We went to our local comic/game shop to buy some basic lands and we overheard a fellow player saying it's worth it to buy a booster box because you usually always get back what you put into it from the valuable cards you find. Well, if that's true, we'd like to buy a booster box so we can find some rares, but also sell some in order to recoup some or all of the cost of the booster box. We're not sure which set to buy. I pretty much have all the commons/most of the uncommons I will ever need from Avacyn Restored because of WanderingWind.
It's rarely worth it to buy a booster box from a value perspective. It is almost always better to buy singles because you get exactly what you want and you don't wind up with a bunch of junk that goes unused. The trade-off is giving up the thrill of the chase, however, and you lose out on drafting/getting a feel for the set.

I still tend to buy a box of a big set whenever possible, sometimes two if I stumble upon a great deal and it's a fun set. I've already got my Ravnica funds set aside. :D
 
Why is it that so many people approach all the Magic product they buy and events they play in from such a stringent expected value perspective? It isn't a flawed way to approach things, but it just seems so much more prevalent and exposed in Magic than in any other hobby. Is it just that it is generally pretty expensive and thus you want to get the most for your money?

Well, in magic, you seldom want to have every card. You might only really want or need 20% of a set. You can either let your unused snapcasters sit there in your basement, or sell it off for 15 or 20 dollars. That is a substantial amount of money for a piece of card board.

Money is money, and you are bound to get unwanted cards that are worth money. It's human nature to want these cards to be worth as much as possible. Wouldn't it be nice to buy a box to draft and then sell the contents for another box plus 10 dollars? That sounds much better than buying a box and having thr contents worth 30 in total
 
Why is it that so many people approach all the Magic product they buy and events they play in from such a stringent expected value perspective? It isn't a flawed way to approach things, but it just seems so much more prevalent and exposed in Magic than in any other hobby. Is it just that it is generally pretty expensive and thus you want to get the most for your money?
Event wise, if I lose, I can at least say "well at least I got some good cards from it." Lose an event and pull low value cards? Double loss.

Buying packs alone? I can trade $25 cards easier than $.25 ones.
 
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