So what's new in Magic anyway?

[Jigglypuff]

I've been out since Coldsnap. What's new? Anything interesting? I saw these new Planeswalker cards; what's the story with those? Also, what's this I hear about mystic rares? I also saw a third card face with the mana symbols along the border of the art. What's the deal with those?

 

[Killer Joe]

Well,....Wiz Co. got rid of creatures,......and um,....oh yeah Counterspell is back and the new rules say you're allowed to have 8 copies of it,.....and,.....nah, I'm just kidding.

Planeswaklers are kind of neat, they are neither a creature card nor a spell, they are an opponent to your opponent whose on you're side. I don't play with them so that's all I got.

 

[Rakarth]

The new card face was a kind of fad in Time Spiral, as far as I'm aware it represented some point on the timeline, maybe the near future, I can't really remember the story behind it but they're not around any more.

Mythic Rares were brought in to make the game line up with other CCG's that have 4 different rarities. Mythics replace every one in eight rares in boosters (I think thats the fraction)

Planeswalkers introduced a new permanent to mtg, a wizard along similar power level to you yourself they represent allies rather than minions and so have loyalty counters insted of a power and toughness. They (usually) have three abilities, only one of which can be used per turn and the cost for them is paid in loyalty counters. Either +N counters which puts counters on them or -N counters taking counters off. As they aren't creatures they can't be blocked but they can be targeted like you instead. So when you attack an opponent who controls a planeswalker you can instead choose to reassign any damage that gets through to the planeswalker instead. Any damage dealt is taken off in loyalty counters. Zero counters means the planeswalker bites the dust

Check out Liliana Vess in the Build a Deck for a look at how they fit in.

Rakarth

 

[Mooseman]

Also, what's this I hear about mystic rares? I also saw a third card face with the mana symbols along the border of the art. What's the deal with those?

What? You never heard of YuGiOh and UDE alternate art cards? hehe.....

 

[BigBlue]

Planeswalkers have a "life" total which is instead called Loyalty.

They have abilities (which are played as sorceries and only one ability may be played per turn). Their abilities can either add or subtract from their Loyalty (the cost is listed before the ability (+1, -1, -10, -X, etc). If their loyalty goes below one they leave play. You may not spend more loyalty than they possess (so if a Planeswalker currently has 8 loyalty, you can't actiave an ability which costs 9 or more).

An opponent may attack a planeswalker instead of you, you may block the creature using your own creatures. Any damage dealt by creatures to it is done by removing loyalty.

If someone does damage to a player, they (the damager, not the one being damaged) redirect some of that damage to the planeswalker, removing loyalty from it.

Mythic rares:

WotC is trying to cut down on the size of expansions (that was their story anyways). They print sets in sheets of 110 cards (as I recall), Regular rares will show up 3 times on a sheet, while Mythic rares will only show up once. This cuts down on the appearance of these rares (with a purple rarity symbol). So, you'll be less likely to get one. The odd thing is, because of the way they print foils, you may be more likely to get a foil mythic than a mythic... There was much conjecture on how much these will price in the secondary market... I haven't looked at any of them to know an answer to that discussion.

 

[Gizmo]

Mythic rares:

WotC is trying to cut down on the size of expansions (that was their story anyways). They print sets in sheets of 110 cards (as I recall), Regular rares will show up 3 times on a sheet, while Mythic rares will only show up once. This cuts down on the appearance of these rares (with a purple rarity symbol). So, you'll be less likely to get one. The odd thing is, because of the way they print foils, you may be more likely to get a foil mythic than a mythic... There was much conjecture on how much these will price in the secondary market... I haven't looked at any of them to know an answer to that discussion.

Close.

WotC wants to reduce set size for lots of creative/gameplay reasons.

An immediate side effect of reduced set sizes is reduced sales. If there are fewer cards to collect people buy fewer cards. It's economic suicide for WotC to cut 20% of their set size without putting something in place to encourage people to buy packs. Mythic rares is what they came up with to offset the increased commonality of standard rares and avoid their sales dropping too much.

I'm fairly sure the foil mythics thing is completely wrong. Mythic rares aren't actually that rare (something like 1/12 boosters?) and I have already have about a dozen mythic rares just from winning my pre-release and doing a sealed PTQ, but no foil mythics.

Mythic rare price is currently quite high, but it's speculative as it's not quite obvious which of them are good or not. Ajani is good but available in foil very easily, Tezzeret is good in old formats but hasn't really touched standard yet, and Elspeth is borderline good.

 

[Shabbaman]

I haven't read much of a major outrage about the cost of mythics, yet I had expected something like that. It could be that people got used to bizarre prices after Tarmogoyf. Anyway, there's no mythic rare or planeswalker that tempted me open my wallet.

 

[BigBlue]

Yeah, well, I was wrong about the 110 card thing too... they're 121 card sheets... And it is 2 copies of each regular rare and 1 per mythic on a sheet (for Shards - and presumably all large expansions).

 

[Spiderman]

Whoa, Jigglypuff and Gizmo make an appearance while I was gone?!?! In the same thread?

You getting back in the game, Jigglypuff?