Did Magic just die? Wizards just killed most of their professional

>>46900067
We ought to expect a decline of some fashion, yes.

It'll take a couple more decisions in quick succession along the lines of this and the Eldrazi reckoning to actually kill the beast that is MtG though.

What are we upset about now?

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>>46900194
mostly pro players stuff
http://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/ptsoi/2016-and-2017-premier-play-updates-announced-at-ptsoi-2016-04-24

>Platinum pros will receive an appearance fee of $250 for competing at Pro Tours (previously $3,000), an appearance fee of $250 for competing at the World Magic Cup (previously $1,000), and an appearance fee of $250 for competing at a World Magic Cup Qualifier (previously $500).

>2017 is when we move Modern away from being a Pro Tour format

Pros appearance fees got cut from 12k to 1k

The Magic goes away

>>46900267
>2017 is when we move Modern away from being a Pro Tour format
Neo-memedern is go!

>>46900267
>>46900269
Honestly I don't see any issues coming from this for non professional players, you have to wonder how much money those pro players spent on magic, and got others to spend on magic, vrs how much they were getting paid.
If they were getting a lot more money then they were bringing in it is an absolutely sound business decision to lower those appearance and competition fees. Also who follows pro magic? Most the people I know only play casual, and I am guessing that is where a large chunk of their revenue comes from.

Half of the professional players were drug dealers and scmubags, good riddance if they leave.

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>>46900334
I follow professional magic rather closely actually and I'm not the business or economics type, but I would think that pro players bring in sales and hype and short changing them when magic is on an incline seems like a way to drive away the pro player base and all of the hype surrounding it.
also
>>46900371
lolwut?

>>46900371
>There are only 4 pro players and two of them are Drew Levin and Patrick Chapin

>>46900508
Without being able to actually look at all the relevant data we can only speculate on the amount of revenue they brought in vrs how much they took, but I am going to guess in the end it comes down to it was costing more then they were making, or they don't attribute enough money to sales as a result of their pro players, either way I am going to guess it comes down to money.

Also do you play magic? And do you think you will spend less money now that the pros are getting paid less, and probably dropping out/playing less?
Kind of curious since that question is directly related to the economic impact this will most likely have for Magic.

>>46900594
>either way I am going to guess it comes down to money

Sort of. This is all about the judge lawsuit.

>>46900594
I do play magic, but don't really spend any money on it in the primary market (booster, fat packs, etc) I just buy/trade for singles or play sets as needed. I'm not less inclined to buy shit from wizards, but that's because I already don't

>>46900558
>Patrick "Don't dick the dick" Chapin

>>46900651
I don't follow magic at all I just play occasionally with friends, so not sure what that is.
>>46900661
If a lot of the people that follow the pro players feel the same way (honestly way too small a pool to make that any kind of an accurate statement, but for the sake of argument we will use it) then the economic impact would be minor because the people following are not the ones spending money that comes back to them.

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>>46900334
>$1000
>enough to buy a professional deck

Sheet, you can barely even afford a cheap duel disk for that sort of price.

>>46900705
>I don't follow magic at all I just play occasionally with friends, so not sure what that is.

http://blog.legalsolutions.thomsonreuters.com/top-legal-news/magic-card-game-judges-sue-for-lost-wages-claim-to-be-employees/

Remember the eternal semite, the soldier of the ultimate yihad against the living "Kike the user, hail the collector", if maro was killed today and you didn't smile happily ever after you're not a real magic player.
Down with the kikes and down with the list.

>>46900922
MaRo does some questionable things in his position but he is in no way responsible for the preservation of the reserved list

>>46900840
>>$1000
>>enough to buy a professional deck
At the pro level you should already have a pro deck, and that is 1k for showing up, that doesn't include anything you get for winning.

>>46900853
After reading that I really have to side with Wizards on the matter, those people are doing judging as a volunteer effort if they feel they are not treated properly they can just walk away, they have no contract, sure they will lose their certification most likely, but they are not contractually bound as employees for Wizards.

>>46900999
>they can just walk away

They like judging. They just want to be paid for it.

>>46901072
Then they can like it enough to do it as a volunteer or walk away.

>>46901108
For profit companies can't have volunteers

>>46900999
I'm going to be so happy when the culture of demanding people volunteer to assist profit-making ventures dies forever.

>>46901108

Could the same not be said of every other profession?

>>46901132
This could all have been avoided if they just called the Judges interns.

>>46900067
You do realize that the pro scene doesn't really matter that magic for the games profit at all, right? Countless right now are playing casual, draft from either cube or new sets, edh, or even just playing with friends with another format.

>>46901072
The products they receive are their payment and if they get paid per event they wouldn't need sick time.

>>46901164
>The products they receive are their payment
Yeah I don't think a few MTG cards counts as meeting the minimum wage.
>if they get paid per event they wouldn't need sick time
They still need lunch breaks though.
>often putting in shifts longer than eight-hours, and, as the lawsuits allege, not even having sufficient time for a break to eat a meal

>>46901136
That makes sense, but I don't think people here are demanding that.

>>46901164
Paying people with only your products instead of currency was outlawed in the 1800's, you are literally not allowed to do it

>WotC in charge of being massive Jews
>Fuck the pro players
>Fuck the judges twice in six months
Who will they fuck over next?

>>46901361
>Who will they fuck over next?

Small Internet card stores.
You heard it here first.

>>46901361
People who play FNM or LGS owners

>>46901261
So let's say level 2 judges get 80 dollars per day of event they judge as a flat commission while level 3 judges get 90 or 100 if they are the head judge. The judges take rotating breaks with the higher ones earlier on and most of them taking their break when it gets to the finals of each day.

>>46901136
I do volunteer work for stuff like that on occasion because I like doing it, not for personal gain, if you are in it primarily for personal gain you are doing it for the wrong reasons. It's not a job don't treat it as such, if you don't have the time/desire to do it then don't.

>>46900067
Why not go the usual "pro" route and sign up with sponsors?

If these players cant get sponsored, then they probably didnt bring in enough revenue to justify paying them steep rates for appearances.

This change doesn't even affect 0.01% of players.
Most players have never heard about Platinum Status Pros and their payments and most will never hear of them.

The only thing that is important is publicity. High profile events create that, paying platinum pros does not. Even if the overall quality of pros declines because of this, it won't change much.

>>46901482
HE DOES IT FOR FREE

>>46901482
That's fine. But other people do want to get paid, and as long as there's people willing to work for free, those positions will never be for pay.

>>46901693
>>46901673
I do it for fun, it isnt a job.
I have a job for getting paid.

>>46901542
I would assume SCG and CF sponsored their own team of players.
The only problem with this is it will whittle down most of the asian/japan players due to steep airfare and the 'lone rangers'. Coincidentally japan players are mostly lone rangers.

>>46901738
Perhaps Japanese players should band together and get a sponsor together.

>>46901726
Some people will never understand this. It's what I hate about playing music sometimes. There's always that dipshit who thinks he should be able to make a fortune out of our hobby.

>>46901693
It's not a job.

>>46901756
If you want to have it as a job you get a job doing it, if there are no jobs doing it it is not a valid profession. Like if you want to get paid for being a musician you go and get signed on with a company, or try to strike it out solo which is difficult, but you don't go play in the park and get mad when the city doesn't pay you for the service to their park even if they gave you the permit to play there.

>>46901361
>>46901387
MCM and private card traders.

>wuzzat liddle timmy?
>You trading cards?
>Nonono. Lawsuit incoming, not allowed to trade cards in official event, get permaban.

>>46901842
Difference is the city isn't making a profit off your labor if you're playing shitty music in the park. Wizards is directly profiting from having judges at events.

>>46901891
Do you have the figures to show that Wizards is directly profiting from having the events at all?
Also let's replace the park then with a business, you ask to play at the business they agree without an actual contract, or any promise of money exchange, you have no right to go in and demand money for it, if you want money for it you either go somewhere that will pay you, or do something different.

Dont cuts to platinum pro pay and boosts to prize purse help... You know... Us. The ordinary players.

>>46902158
Depends on where that money goes.

>>46902158
Look kid, don't get too uppity before we ban you from even going to FNMs, got it? You're OUR bitch. Not the other way around, loser.
t. Mark "The nose" Rosewater

>>46902261
They increased prize support for all the tournaments they cut appearance fees for

>>46902271
What the fuck is this even supposed to mean

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Hahaha get mad pro fags.

This change is great. Are you afraid you may have to go get a real job now instead of being paid just to be an ass in a seat?

Look at Star City coverage. Both in terms of quality and frequency of events. Tell me how the fact that none of those players get exorbitant appearance fees influences whether or not people watch. Then look at Wizards' official crappy coverage.

The bottom line is that they want to keep the tip top echelon of pro players competitive by giving the winner of a high profile tournament more instead of giving the usual suspects too much. It's a good move that ensures no one gets to rest on their laurels just for being a household name in MtG.

Of course pros are going to be mad as this takes money of out their pockets. You're going to see a loud, vocal minority getting upset about this but literally no one else will care.

>>46902900
Now they'll stream HS for many a shekel :v)

>>46900946
No but he could do a lot more to get rid of it.

>>46900067
Who needs mtg when you have Hearthstone?

>>46901108
Are you ignoring the fact that they have to spend thousands on airfare, hotels, and decks? And that almost all pro players do a shit ton to advertise the game? Don't be a moron. And since when did it become cool to defend huge greedy companies?

Does this matter to non-pros?

>>46902900
It makes the game more about money and less about an awesome community of friends that all basically do a fuckton of advertising for free. That like saying that the NFL should only pay players that win. Do you not understand how advertising works? Its not about fucking winning, its all about an ecosystem that sells their product. And making it financial infeasible for high profile players to attend tournaments is a bad move.

I know this is 4chan, and you are a really cool contrarian dude that knows everything, but they are kneecapping one of their best marketing outlets in favor of MAYBE getting more press from having larger prize pools.

>>46903132
Well, if fucking over top-tier high profile players affects the longevity of the game, then yeah.

>>46903025
Like what?
It's a legal department thing.
Maro WANTS the Reserved List gone.

>>46903235
Until the list isn't gone this isn't really a game but a stock simulator, so your "opinion" is dogshit maro, anhero.

>>46902304
I highly doubt that the increase is in anyway comparable to the cut

>>46903358
WotC employee directory, as imagined by /tg/

Art: Maro
Organized play: Maro
R and D: Maro
Design: Maro
Legal: Maro

>>46903620
Worlds is going to a $500,000 prize purse

>>46903647
WotC employee directory, reality

Head: Maro
The rest: Lol who the fuck cares.
Bad design: Nagle

>>46900067
Pros have little or no impact on Wizards' bottom line. You think pros buy packs?

>>46901946
Hey let's just replace the park with a concert, the players are so musicians and the judges are the security guards.
Scurity guards get paid to ensure nobody with ill intentiona enters the stage and that no one carries sometging illegal at the concert, they basically watch out that nobody violates the rules. Same as judges at magic events.
Do the musicians or their record label profit from having the security guards? Absolutely not. They profit from people going to concerts (events sich as protour) and buying records (packs, decks, etc.) so why do the security guards get paid? After all they get free live music from a band for their effort.
Judges should definetely get paid, because they ensure the tournament doesn't end up a big mess.

>>46901657
A lot of players follow the scene a little bit, watch the pro tour, have a couple favorite players

When those players announce that magic has been awful to them and they are moving to hearthstone the players might follow

see Brian Kibler

>>46902304
>They increased prize support for all the tournaments they cut appearance fees for

That is incorrect. They're increasing the prize pool for the Magic World Championship. That's it.

>>46905670
I'm not sure many magic players would leave the game for Hearthstone. Hearthstone has a very different appeal than MTG. It's fast, simple, and easy to pick up all while still being engaging, none of which are the sort of things that draw people to MTG. Hearthstone is a good game and does what it's designed to do extremely well, but it's pretty obvious to anyone who plays both games what Hearthstone lacks compared to Magic.

>>46907453
Hearthstone streaming makes mad dosh

>>46903799

You think packs would sell nearly as well without chase rares and netlist staples that get famous due to pros?

>>46900067
Good. Maybe it'll cause people to backlash at hasbro/wizards for once.

>>46903097
Years ago. It's almost all the internet does anymore. Defend the shit out of corrupt businessmen and shady corporations.

>>46905670
You mean the players who aren't playing for competitive reasons but solely for money? Good riddance. And kibler is one of those people. He pretty much dropped Magic as soon as Hearthstone got big and offered lots of money and prestige.

>>46909483
It's the power of the eternal kike, when you saw the light, you yelled at your uncle /pol/, now you will enjoy the eternal kike.

You had a chance to raise your arm and hail, but now you bend over and prep the bull for your zionists masters.

>>46909617
>who aren't playing for competitive reasons but solely for money?
that makes absolutely no sense anon

>>46909723
Literally no other cardgame requieres as much money invested as magic.

Technically speaking it's actually cheaper to become a proplayer of an ACTUAL sport than it is to become a magic proplayer.
>Inb4 limitards

>>46909866
how can you possibly play for money without playing at the highest level of competition

>>46909881
You don't play magic, do you?

>>46909924
So the people who ground out 50 pro points in a single season weren't playing because they wanted competition but because it pays so well

do you play magic? pros didn't get paid well before this change, there was a big scandal last year about a pro taking a foil goyf over a better card in draft because he wanted the money

>>46910013
>pros didn't get paid well before this change
>And now they get paid even worse
You see the problem here kike?

>>46900067
Farewell, crybabies, what else can I say. Cleaning community from scum is very important.

>>46909620
Fuck off

Whatever. As a casual player in a group of 5 close friends, I can officially say that not a single one of us has ever given two shits about professional play. In fact, the only time we ever watched a professional match was over YouTube for background noise while we were playing two-headed chimera.

>>46910426
>two-headed chimera.
Don't you mean two-headed giant?

>>46910451
Nope. Two-headed chimera. It's like two-headed giant, except not. The two teams of two would share the field, share their hands, and share their mana pool. One player on each team would be the "lion head" and play an aggro based deck while the "goat head" would play a support/control based deck. Then there is a fifth player that plays by different rules all-together. He is considered the "snake tail" and his purpose is to bite someone in the ass every turn. At the beginning of every turn for the two-player pairs the snake tail flips a coin. If the coin is heads up he plays his turn at the exact same time as the current pair, focusing all his efforts on the opposite pair of players. He has no life-total, a decreased deck size, and has to follow the coin flip.

>>46910360
t. wotc shill
You were warned.
Enjoy getting dicked judges.
Enjoy getting dicked players.
Kike reigns them all, with an iron fist, not because he work for it, but because they didn't listen.

>>46910562
that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard

>>46910426
The point is that Wizards broke a big promise to these players. Imagine your boss gave you a big project, and said at the end of it you would get a big commission if it was done well enough. So you slave away for months, and then a week before the deadline he cuts the commission by 90%. That's the issue, how Wizards is being colossally disrespectful towards its players. It should concern you, even if you only ever play casual, because if Wizards is this willing to fuck over its most devoted and revenue-generating players, what does that say about their opinion of the rest of us?

>>46903263
I don't see anyone choosing to stop playing on any sort of relevant scale because some welfare bux get taken out of "professional" play.

>>46907471
for like 10 people, maybe

>>46910938
did you even see the OP?

>>46908418
uh...yeah?

avacyn got to $50 before the protour happened, and I'm sure other decks like the ones we saw at the PT would have popped up given a little more time

>>46910991

A single japanese crybaby, wow such losses I guess MtG is dead :^(

>>46911029
hey mister leave those goalposts where they were

>>46911043
I never said people wouldn't stop playing, I said they wouldn't stop playing on a relevant scale.

I'm assuming you just missed that part.

>>46910734
I play magic passively, this affect me none. I just hate nazis

>>46900334
>Also who follows pro magic?

A lot of people do. Including people who don't actually play Magic because Magic is absurdly expensive. It's cool to see the actual best in the world do their thing.

Without the pros, Magic is going to become a more casual game as an inevitability. I don't think that's good for the game.

>>46910743
You obviously haven't met a competitive magic player.
>I just spent a mortgage payment on this new aggro deck so I can win $8 worth of booster packs at FNM

>>46911144
I am a competitive magic player

nice strawman though, are you winning the kitchen table open series?

>>46911029
>A single japanese crybaby, wow such losses I guess MtG is dead

That guy happens to be the single most popular Magic streamer in the world. If he quits Magic, a large chunk of Asia quits Magic.

>>46911181
>Thinking kitchen casual is competitive
>Even jokingly
Lol. Go stress out over the next reserve list reprinting while I play the game like it's meant to play. For fun.

>>46911209
>I can't have fun while playing competitively
I truly pity you.

>>46911207
>So my favorite AsiaTube streamer just quit
>Guess I'll throw away my card collection and hop on the next cool card game
Retard

>>46911222
You really can't. With the smell, the fat grognards, the open hostility from everyone against each other, and the constant swearing is not a atmosphere that promotes fun.

>>46903799
>Pros have little or no impact on Wizards' bottom line.
>Source: My ass

The pros are living advertisements for the game. The fact alone that there ARE professional Magic players at all makes the game way more serious business than the pointless nerd hobby it otherwise is.

>>46911258
You're either strawmaning so hard you could start your own farming business, or you've had an unbelievably shitty LGS experience.

>>46911258
have you never played competitive magic?

I have never experienced any of this, except the fat grognards

>>46911227

That's literally what's going to happen, genius.

>>46911300

I was permanently spooked away from Magic tournaments because the judge at an FNM was a rude asshole.

This was during Tempest.

>>46909866

That's because M:tG is the only game where card prices go up every year in Eternal. Other card games can be very expensive too. Except their prices don't go up with inflation.

>>46910997

Avacyn is a terrible example you moron, because she's a shit card in eternal and is STILL at a high price. Her price had nothing to do with competitiveness and everything to do with angel waifu.

>>46900999

It's literally illegal to do "volunteer work" for a for-profit company. It breaks labor laws.

>>46900067
>BOOHOO
>NOW I ONLY GET FREE HOTEL, TRAVEL, FOOD AND 3 BYES
God forbid they make tournament prize structure actually good instead of giving all the money to has-been's.

>>46911367
Things are much different, most people are mid 20's and are the typical nerdy white guys you'd expect to be playing. Generally pretty friendly.

>>46911421
>people who got 50 pro points in a single season
>has beens

>>46900067
Magic didn't die. It still sells ridiculously well in a huge number of places. Most people buying cards I know don't even know about this happening and wouldn't care anyway if they did.
Try not to see the world only in terms how it directly related to you and things you already know about; you'll look less like an idiot and learn a lot more because you've stopped assuming the cosmos revolves around you.

>>46911421
lol if you think that maybe a grand in travel stuff is worth the effort required to get those perks.

You can play magic basically every hour of the day and live like a college student or you can get a shitty office job and make enough to both play magic and travel AND live decently.

>>46911421
Even compensating for all of that is not enough incentive now that they get practically nothing else. Could you afford to take a week off of work once a month all year?

>>46900999
>After reading that I really have to side with Wizards on the matter
I don't think you actually read it.

>>46900067

The slashing of the plattypro compensations means basically that there's no real way to be a pro Magic player anymore. Nobody in the world is good enough to make the finals or quarterfinals every year, and the prize pools are not MOBA level high so you can't just aim for the big payday. Becoming one of the golden boys that get some money just for appearing was the big juicy carrot dangling in front of the hordes of hopefuls, and that carrot was just replaced with nothing.

The result of this move will be that majority of the actual best Magic players in the world will stop playing competitively, since it just became a cost to them, and each PT will be filled with whatever local randoms were available. Majority of Magic players are really shit at Magic and won't notice the difference between masterful play and decent play, and I guess that's what Hasbro is banking on - the idea that as long as there's some kind of an event, it doesn't matter who's in it.

>>46911487

Holy shit the irony on that second paragraph

>>46911496
>not enough incentive
To do what? Play magic? Nigger 90% of their income came form supplemental content.

The money lost is incredibly minor, the vast majority of people are just pissed they did it at the end of the seasons grind instead of giving some notice.

>>46903235
>less about an awesome community of friends
Fuck off faggot.
The old boys pro club where they are immune to the rules, get cards earlier than anyone else, and can get anyone they dislike suspended can go fuck themselves.

>>46911331
Not really. People will continue to play magic, despite the top 0.0001% of players not getting paid $12,000 to show up to a tournament.

>>46911300
Why are you playing competitive magic? that's where you find the worst of people. Tried getting into a standard tournament but the fucktards with the $1,200 decks with all-foil lands and shit were the worst elitist pricks you could imagine.

I can't belive this hasn't been really brought up yet , but why did they cut it by such a large percentage ass opposed to something like a 50%? There probably would be less backlash if the cuts weren't so severe

>>46911816
I wouldn't say that the money lost is minor, but I guess that's subjective. Considering only the Pro Tour, it's a decrease of $11,000 in a year.

>>46912008

Please follow replies beyond one step back, thank you. We are discussing Watanabe specifically. Watanabe is the most popular Magic streamer in the world, and if he's quitting Magic, basically whole Japan is quitting Magic. And it's literally going to be because he quit.

>>46911416
>Avacyn a shit card
>A 4/4 flash vigilance flying (Serra angel, but better) that gives indestructible on the turn it goes in, then flips for a soft board wipe. If you time it right (like when someone throws in a "sacrifice a permanent") you can get her soft board wipe while all your stuff is invincible.

>>46912098
You realize he said "Eternal right" and in that respect she's mediocre

>>46912098
I think it is the older Avacyn, anon.

>>46912098
>Eternal
Try reading

>>46912053

They're not giving much in way of justification. This is from their site:

>These decisions were not made lightly, and were finalized only after much discussion about the goals of the Pro Tour Players Club. The appearance fees we awarded for Platinum pros were meant to assist in maintaining the professional Magic player’s lifestyle; upon scrupulous evaluation, we believe that the program is not succeeding at this goal, and have made the decision to decrease appearance fees.

Choice of words is curious, because they're not saying they're abandoning the goal, rather they're claiming paying guaranteed money doesn't reach the goal.

>>46912071
>Oh, my favorite magic player is not playing it anymore
>Let me throw away the hundreds I invested into this game because someone on the internet I've never met stopped playing it.
>It's now impossible for me to enjoy the game because he isn't playing anymore.
Get your head out of your ass and realize that people couldn't give less of a shit about Pro players.

>>46912048
once again, I have never run into this stereotype everyone bitches about, every person I play against is normally fun, helpful, and has good hygiene, the worst person I have played against was a fat brony who didn't talk much

>>46912053
Likely because someone asked the important question of "how much is it worth to pay these guys to show up?" and the calculated answer was "We lose money. We literally lose money by having these people show up. They are awful nerds that no one likes."

"What can we do?"

"Get them to quit, and usher in a larger field of more casual players in hopes of pro players being more charismatic and less creepy losers who've dedicated too much of their lives to this game."

>>46912166
But how? How can you enjoy a game where every single other player is rocking a 4-digit dollar deck and you've got a budget standard deck?

>>46912098

Serra angel is only playable in limited

Cards are only expensive for the sake of constructed, presumably, since you can't buy yourself a limited deck

So a card being a Serra angel with some added value doesn't mean it's going to be good

I happen to think avacyn is decent in standard but it's definitely nothing too crazy

>>46912199
By having a good time?

anon are you asking me how to have fun playing a fantasy card game?

>>46912183

Are the pros really creepy losers with no charisma?

Tom Ross seems like a stylish dude at least

>>46900067
>Did Magic just die?
No. Worst things have happened and everyone thinks magic is going to die every two weeks. I'm pretty sure there was an entire thread complaining about how magic was going to die because Wizards didn't pay cash to judges.

>>46912251
I have a crush on tom ross

I want him to heroically infect me

>>46912233
But HOW can you have a good time while losing 1-3 or 0-4 every match because your deck isn't "competitive" enough?

So Platinum appearance fees are being reallocated to prize winnings. The thing is, there's a lot of luck involved in this game. You could be the best player in the world and totally scrub out.

Like the lottery, you have to ask yourself, is it better that one person win a huge jackpot of millions of dollars or is it better that many people win $100,000 each.

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Kind of hope this game dies desu, MtG and 40K are two of the most consumerist cancers on tabletop gaming. They set a ridiculous bar for pricing in this hobby and attract a lot of unsavory people.

>>46912286
budget decks win FNM every week dude, many budget decks can 4-0 FNM if you are really good at the game

>>46912160

You don't get it and you'll probably never get it because you're a fucking idiot. You don't get that all those people are only interested in Magic at all because of him. If he switches to HS like Kibler or something else, they will switch with him, because they follow him, not Magic.

>>46912293
>They set a ridiculous bar for pricing in this hobby
but CCGs and wargames and TRPGs are all different hobbies desu senpai

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>>46912251
>Are the pros really creepy losers with no charisma
Most of them are huge faggots

>>46912312
Skill<Money
That is the rule in magic.
Those budget decks only go 4-0 because nobody else in that entire event can build anything but budget.

>>46912251
some are good
some are shit

>>46912251
>>46912278
Go to sleep, Tom.

>>46912183

You're projecting harder than I've ever seen anyone project.

Also the pro in any game is ALWAYS going to be somebody who spent way too much of his life on that game. You cannot be pro as a casual, not ever, not in anything.

>>46912251

No.

>>46912288
Im not a pro so its pure upside for me.

>>46912337
You don't get it do you. He's the most popular MAGIC player because the people following him love MAGIC. The people that follow him on YouTube probably follow 3 or 4 other MAGIC YouTube channels. Him dropping might upset a trivially small percent of Japan's player base, but if they didn't even love playing magic in the beginning it's better that they leave over something like that.

>>46912183
Yeah, there's a lot of truth in your post.

See, the people depending on these Platinum appearance fees are not living well. It does not cover the cost of living. People who survive on so little probably are going to cut corners on appearance to live off that much - they're not going to show up with clean, laundered, and shiny jerseys.

What you want, for appearances sake, is people who are well established in life who play Magic competitively as a hobby - not as a career. The sort of people who have their lives together and can afford to play Magic competitively can probably afford to travel and shower and not show up disheveled and would not care whether they won or lost. The way Magic players who are earning fees for showing up now they're fucking sleeping in airports and shit. These changes will force players to get their fucking lives together first so that if they win a Magic event it's more like a bonus than the difference between eating that week.

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>>46910744
These people don't exist in a vacuum though. Sure, pros give Wizards cash, but many of them are sponsored by huge companies, and even smaller groups.

What this move actually does is re-establish the rules for businesses that compete by backing certain players to win events. It also incentivizes the creation of competing entry-level competitive play circuits to the SCG Tour. Wizards has created an opportunity for someone to offer greater incentives for high level competitive play if there's really demand.

Pro players as individuals are just pawns to a larger meta scheme involving Wizards and huge buying groups. It's all an elaborate game being played on an unfathomably large scale.

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Some say that the reduction of money incentives is because of the Judges lawsuit.

>>46912505
Thats just WOTC shills trying to shift the blame.

Kibler's article had it the best. Its for their new "We wanna be an esport" image of huge prize pools shift.

Also the hall of fame is filled with literally who's that bring them no money to attending events.

>>46912395
>trivially small percent of Japan's player base
>he's the most popular player in Japan

Makes no sense.

Even casuals back in my day knew who Kai Budde and Jon Finkel were. They appeared on fucking creature cards for fuck's sake. I can only assume even Japanese casuals know who he is.

>>46912145

I have to assume its just meaningless corporate speak. The fact that she goes on to imply that platinum pros will be better served by an increased worlds prize pool is so fucking ridiculous it's not even worth thinking about.

>>46912551
90% of players have no idea.

People who attend FNM are the vast majority and even still very easily half of them have no idea why Confidant is called Bob or Snapcaster Tiago.

>>46912599
Why is that one blue wizard that's taps for damage called Tim?

>>46912599
Till Tiago was a bitch and got the program offed.

>>46912751
What did he do?

>>46912599
I have literally never heard if Snapcaster being called tiago and I've been playing legacy for 6 years and been jamming him since he came out

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>>46912737
Monty python reference.

>>46912780
Really? Its pretty damn common here on the east coast.

Idk why there's so much hate for pro players? I mean were people here molested by Brad Nelson or what? Bottom line is the appearance fees pretty much just paid for pros airfare and cards so they could play the circuit and break formats without going bankrupt. Wizards cut it because they are a company and felt it was an easy cut to pad their bottom line, real dick move when their game is doing well. And no that money is not going to "normal players" the WMC is the 24 best players and theyre putting in way less than theyre saving. Just a cold, penny pinching move. I bet whichever accountant at Hasbro who came up with it got a bonus and a gift card to Fridays.

>>46912888

Because that's literally the way scrubs are.

>>46912810
Maybe it's an east coast thing, I've never been to the east coast, and I'm canadian if that changes to further

>>46900067

Jon Finkel's thoughts on the Pro Tour changes. Finkel, in case you don't know, is basically the best Magic player of all time and he's also a Hall-of-Famer so he has no personal stake in this (HoF is not affected).

http://jonnymagic00.blogspot.com/2016/04/pro-tour-player-club-thoughts.html

>>46901154
internship laws state that in order for one to be unpaid, it has to be a purely educational internship. If you help the company you work for at all with any work, as opposed to them just teaching you, you have to be paid.

>>46912361
ok shitter blame the tier 1 fags instead of you just sucking

no doubt the tier 1 decks are the better decks but if you are going 0-4 every week look in the mirror for your problem, not your paycheck

>>46912492
it goes all the way down the rabbit hole, hasbro, then the rothschilds, then the US govt, then international geopolitical supergroups and all of them hate dredge

>>46912361
Chinese counterfeiters proved that's not true

>>46912390
Its not, Its only for the Championship which only the top 24 players are invited to. Its only upside for Wotc, who save a bunch of cash. Why do casuals think this helps them?

>>46913556
>Its only for the Championship
PT also went up you retard

>>46913088
>I NEEDED THAT MONEY IN CASE I LOST
Why should a small subset of players get rewarded for losing?

Hell its the same retarded argument the pros used when WOTC tried to take away their 3 GP byes whose very existence make competitive magic a joke.

>>46913088
He may be a good magic player but the economics is what's important.

I'm still reading and I don't really give a shit about magic. But higher top end prize pools attract more attention for sure.
His whining about the money jumping significantly when you make top 8 is dumb because that's how it really should be in a competitive setting. Forget safety cushions. If you can't hack it you don't deserve it, that's pretty common among any competitive scene.

And stuff like this is silly;
>So they’re saying that the program was not enough to maintain the Pro Player lifestyle, and as a result they’re cutting it?
The ROI was negligible so they stopped giving them money. Pretty simple.

>>46913602
Do you have a source for that info?

>>46913672
Kibler's article was better and less him throwing a bitchfit they took his money.
http://bmkgaming.com/broken-promises-thoughts-pro-tour-changes/

>We keep hearing it all the time – Magic is the biggest it’s ever been. Record sales and profits year over year. And yet what we get are cuts to event coverage and WotC stealing from Platinum players today to fund their marketing drive in 2017

>>46913742
Do these pro tours actually make any money?

Like I see them on twitch but they don't have decent sponsor decks or anything.

>>46913602
No they aren't you assclown learn to read.

>>46901132
This is the law, and what the judges want doesn't actually matter.

If we let corporations accept volunteers, soon they'll be pressuring regular employees to "volunteer" in their off-time.

>>46901420
Their pay would have to at least meet the minimum wage. It's the law.

>>46913787
The idea is that they market the new set with them. And that they provide a marquee event for competitive players to aspire to, so theyll buy cards so they can stay competitive. Part of it being a marquee event is a roster of pro players on camera, but that' gonna change.

>Pros throw a bitchfit that someone took a foil goyf in the top 8 for money
>All saying the integrity of the game is mroe important than the money
>The same fags then throw a bitchfit when WOTC takes their handouts back
TOP KEK

>>46912763
His original submission was a land that taps for U and can be discarded for 2UU to counter a spell. Getting him to change from that was incredibly difficult, and Snapcaster was the compromise.

I don't know whats worse WOTC saying fuck you to pro players in the middle of a pro tour. Or the fact that they released a documentary 2-3 days after about how hard and rewarding it is to become a high level pro player.

>>46900267
So wait, the "pros" now no longer get a fat load of dosh just for showing up and now have to actually PLAY and actually WIN to earn their money?

Oh no what horror

>>46900067
I'll still play magic no matter what these pro players do, but watching PTs is one of the thing i do and it would be sad if it have less japan players competing.
Watching japan pro players play is a joy. They're fast, tidy with almost no misplays.

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>>46900067
>there are professional magic players
i just bought my very first deck and what is this

>>46916999
There have been pro magic players since the late 90s

>>46916999
Some irrelevant. Don't worry about it.

As someone who Dropped MtG more than a decade ago, I find this whole situation basically comical.

>>46917165

My niggawalka

Fuck all these upstart Jace Beleren neowalking faglords and their fancy card borders.

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>>46917105
>>46917091
i bought the new red and black vampire deck because I wanted to be a necromancer, how fucked am I?

>>46917340
Not fucked at all, especially if you just play casually.

>>46910562
That sounds like fucking mayhem, I gotta try that

>>46917194
magic died with mirroden

the first one

>>46912505
It's to do with possibly precluding further lawsuits against pro players being perceived as Wizards employees. See the college football other shitstorm.

>>46917626
That seems like it could get sketchy if Pro players were perceived as employees and still capable of winning prizes.

>>46917340
>>46916999
Never let /tg/ threads and so-called pro players tell you what cards and decks should you play.
Use what you think is cool and have fun with casting spells like a wizard. The moment you start thinking like a typical player, the magic will be gone.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCm-rRUwNGk

>release a documentary about pro players after screwing them over

lel

>>46900067

Who the fuck cares about these "pros" anyway.

>>46900067

>fatties won't get paid gold anymore
>fatties have to learn a skill

This is so horrible.

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>>46919524
>>46914066
>>46900067
Professional play isn't the "head" of magic; it's just one of many marketing strategies. It's essentially an advertising campaign. A negligibly tiny minority of players are paid enough to live on in return for appearing at events and promoting the game. Except they don't do a very good job at it. And when an advertising campaign isn't working, you change it. It doesn't mean the whole business is dead; it just means they'll try some other marketing idea. Nobody said Magic was dead when they stopped doing those terrible TV commercials with the puppets.

>>46900853
>>46900999


Wizard really fucked up by not staying up to speed about labor related rulings.

They are going to want to settle the lawsuit ASAP because letting it play out in court is probably not going to end up in their favor.

>>46901482
Wizards is not a nonprofit organization, they can not by the definition of the law claim that judges are volunteers.
Further, wizards is the sole entity that trains and certifies judges, and the events where Judges operate in their official capacity are all sanctioned by wizards. Even worse, they judges are actually compensated, but in product.

Essentially, wizards are training people to do work that benefits wizards, retain the sole rights to certify or de-certify them, and all the work they do take place during wizards sanctioned events meant to promote their product.

Wizards has basically gotten away with training people that they have an employer relationship with but that essentially work for free, under conditions that they wouldn't be allowed to make employees work under, despite insisting on being the only ones that are allowed to certify them or what events can have judges.

It's sketchy as fuck and the ruling mentioned in the linked article illustrates that wizards basically fit the description used to define an employer in the ruling.

Someone at wizard legal sweating blood right now because they didn't catch this and switch gears before it became a thing.

>>46900067
>Did Magic just die?

The majority of wizards income comes from kids who buy boosters.

A significant portion of the people who care about pro players spend most of their money on the second hand market.

They could basically put every pro player on a plane and crash it into a mountainside without it jeopardizing the franchise.

>>46920067

Where do you think the second hand market gets their cards? They either crack hundreds of boxes or purchase fullsets gathered online via MODO.

I couldn't care less about "pros" and the Pro Tour. Wizards should push the GPs and maybe spread the top 8 pie a little more even so "casual" players have more incentive to participate.

>>46920117
Trading and second hand purchases lowers the amount of boosters opened per individual players since it makes the collecting process more effective.

The average kid who buys a ton of boosters will be sitting on a ton of cards they don't use or can't be bothered with, essentially taking them out of circulation. This is good for wizards because it means they're not available for other people who might want them, effectively leading to more boosters needing to be opened.

But the person who cracks a box to flip it on the second hand market results in people only buying the cards they want, meaning the process becomes more effective and requires less cards opened in total.

Wizards wet dream is a kid who buys booster packs every month, plays with his friends and has a shoebox full or random cards that nobody except him will ever get to use until he quits the hobby, and the second hand market swoops in and buys the lot for peanuts.

>>46920237
Thats so wrong. Without a thriving secondary market magic would be just like other failed games, like pokemon and yugioh. No store support, no large events, no big releases 4 to 5 times a year. Wizards is smart enough to recognize the value of the secondary market. Idk how your model makes sense, no kid is going to open as much product as the average store does so they can fill up their binders and commons boxes.

>>46913602
Casuals don't qualify or get invited to the pro tour either, so I don't know what your point is.

>>46913643
Appearance fees didn't exist to "reward people for losing," they were there to offset the fact that Magic is a game with tons of variance, and it's entirely possible to be the best player in the world and still scrub out of any given tournament because you got mana flooded/screwed. By slashing appearance fees to increase payouts to tournament players, they've effectively made it impossible to be a pro player. This is a bad thing for the game because Pros are great advertisement, and the allur of becoming a pro gets tons of players to spend a lot of money chasing the dream. The fact that they took benefits they'd promised away from people who have worked their asses off to make plat this season without any warning is just icing on the shit cake.

>>46920067
It's funny how so much of the coverage at protour is about the pros, their personalities, they interview them and show them in their testing house and shit like that. That's basically free content, content marketing magic itself and competitive play. Wizards uses these pros for marketing, or used to at least and that's perfectly fine since they get paid. Now they won't anymore, odds are they are losing out on alot of fan favourites on coverage.
This won't have a huge impact for the casual player, but it can only hurt magic as a game, making competitive less accessible, less rewarding, less interesting and less marketed after all.

>>46913643
It's there because wotc is stingy. The prize is hardly enough incentive for someone to cough their own money for an accomodation to go to tournaments.
Remember the foil tarmogoyf thing? The guy gets like 3 times the 1st prize for selling the thing.

>>46920612
He only got that much because he sold it, promising to donate the money and because it was "the" goyf from a huge drama incident.

>>46911416

She's a Standard powerhouse mythic out of the newest set and was a playset in the last major winning deck Rubin ran. The next year will be defined by either you run Avacyn or you run maindeck answers to her.

I agree she's not going anywhere in older formats, but Standard has a huge impact on card prices, especially mythics.

>>46920639
The prize is still small though.
With this move we'll probably not only going to see new pro faces, but most probably a trend that GPs and PTs will only be attended by locals.

>>46920639
>He only got that much because he sold it
Well also because it was the only foil goyf opened in the top 8 of the largest MTG tournament yet and the only one of its kind stamped as so.

>>46912160
You don't know shit about asians do you boy? They're soulless rice robots with no sense of individuality and if a famous jap player quits and moves to something else they'll all be stumbling over each other to chase after him

>>46920547
>Appearance fees didn't exist to "reward people for losing," they were there to offset the fact that Magic is a game with tons of variance
What? Don't be retarded. Appearance fees for hall of famers existed purely so they could market them at tournaments.

As it turns out no one gives a fuck if one is at a GP or not.

>>46920731
After rotation she will be expensive thanks to muh collectors.
i wanted to try her on my uwr modern control

>>46912432

The whole point of being a pro player is that you can make playing MTG your profession. Hence the term "pro." You're quite right that most of the pros we have are either making money in other ventures or else wise financially stable enough to not need the game.

It's not current platinum players who are most hurt by the changes, it's the players who invested their time and energy grinding points to get the reward promised to them, only to have the terms changed 75% of the way through the season. They've been screwed over.

>>46911420
Fine, they are interns now. Problem solved.

>>46920834
You would be hard pressed to find a pro player of anything barring certain sports players who don't have the majority of their income from supplemental things like advertisements or making content.

Hell even the esports WOTC is trying to emulate they make 90% of their money via streaming and only show up to tournaments so that their streaming money will go up.

>>46920799

Not sure why you'd run her instead of a good control card, but to each their own.

I'd be willing to bet you can pick them up for about 15 bucks come rotation.

>>46920897
The real issue is who are these filthy fucking subhuman troglodytes paying so fucking much to spam shitty twitch memos on a stream about a children's card game? Streaming shouldn't be anywhere near as profitable as it is

>>46920865

Intern laws mean you can't be forced to actually do work that benefits from the company. It needs to be purely in an educational role. You could intern WITH a judge but not intern AS a judge.

>>46920935
Its like that carnival game where you spend $5 to throw balls at someone to dunk them in the water.

Only really pathetic since its the internet.

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>>46900067
>Did Magic just die?

Only the competitive scene.

>>46921021
>No one other than platinum grinders go to GP's
Whew

>>46920790
I'd say most people don't give a fuck about GPs, and they certainly will give less of a fuck if you only see random Rauls and Pablos playing at the next european gp and not a single "known" player.

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>>46910013
>there was a big scandal last year about a pro taking a foil goyf over a better card in draft because he wanted the money
and now all those same people that were admonishing him are up in arms that they're not being paid enough to show up and play.
nobody i know gives a fuck about these 'pros' outside of lists to netdeck. even that fuckstain hoogland has a real job. give me a fucking break, ''''''''''magic pros''''''''''

>>46920790
The hall of fame appearance changes were, yeah, but nobody's up in arms about that. People are upset because of the platinum changes, which are a much bigger deal and we're specifically in place to help support the pro player lifestyle. They even mentioned this in their explanation for the changes. For some reason, though, their solution to "these appearance fees aren't really enough" was to all but eliminate them and put a portion of the money they saved into the prize pool of a single 24-man tournament, fucking the pros over even more than they already were.

>>46921443
>here is problem
>so let's make it worse lamo
Good ol' wotc quality. Nobody should even be surprised desu

>>46921443
>Pros have to win games to get money now
>On top of getting a fuck ton of free byes and early access to cards as well as free shit
>Not to mention free board and travel
HOW WILL THEY EVER COMPETE NOW?

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>The company that makes my favorite fantasy card game has decided that they are not going to pay me as much to show up at their tournaments
>Now I have to get a real job and my anus has never been so annihilated

>>46921999
You missed the part where they throw twitter tantrums and threaten to sue.

>Someone made a comparison to the plat changes and welfare
Now I cant get the image of blackface neckbeard throwing a temper tantrum.

Also the hilarious part is there's 34 whole platinum players. Suddenly hundreds of pros are unable to play magic forever because literally less players than I get at FNM aren't getting their welfare checks.

>>46900508
As a business and economics type, I assume Wizards has more information about revenue vs cost for pro players. Many good business decisions seem totally fucking wacky up front. See Fiber lines, high volume stock trading, portfolio balancing, Google's IPO, Age of Sigmar etc. I trust wizard's knows what they're doing.

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>>46922013
>throw twitter tantrums and threaten to sue
That goes without saying. It's the 2016 version of breathing.

>>46922154
>mfw
How will Magic ever survive?!

>>46921218
The Magic pro scene is 80% cancer. Greedy assholes, manchildren and cheaters leaving is only good for the game. The people passionate about the game will stay, those that are mostly in it for the money can go and stay go.

>>46922476
i'm with you. i'm still going to travel for the occasional open or gp because the trip itself is fucking fun and on top of that i get to play cards all weekend or drink excessively OR play cards AND drink excessively regardless of making day 2. like i'm going to gp charlotte for the second year in a row because i want to fucking roll up to the cookout order window and make a nest for the weekend. i am going to drown myself in $5 combos, sweet tea and cheerwine and it is going to be glorious regardless of making day 2.

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Can someone give me a rundown on what happened and why people are flipping shit?

>>46922841
Read the fucking thread

Honestly, I get most of you guys get off on being contrarian as shit and laughing at people, but doing that shit in the middle of season instead of announcing the end of those showing-up fees for the season after players have sunk time and money to grind it is just not a good conduct for a company which wants to keep the trust of its community as a whole.

But I guess you're also going to be contrarian about that, so, whatever.

>>46922154
>Comparing the money needed for players to fucking buy airfare and hotel rooms to welfare.

Dude, remember when people on welfare bring in millions of dollars of revenue through their businesses and free advertising?

I fucking hate /v/ so much. Everyone is desperate to convince themselves they don't lead miserable pathetic lives that they literally need to make everyone else seem like an idiot, and every event seem like the Titanic.

>>46911137

That's because you're a fucking idiot.

More casual = more players = more profit.

>>46922013
Holy shit, these people can't be for real. What are they even going to sue WotC about?

>>46923325
They may have a promissory estoppel case, or however the fuck you spell that, since WotC promised certain rewards and then decided "lol jk fags" 3/4 of the way through the season.

Most likely there won't be a suit, though, because I'm pretty sure WotC were smart enough to plaster disclaimers about how rewards are subject to change all over their relevant rewards pages.

>>46923204
It's super shitty, but WotC/Hasbro fucking over pro players is basically par for the course at this point. People like Kibler have been talking about how the prize payouts for Magic events outside of one or two high-profile tournaments have been laughably small compared to other gaming events for years now.

Honestly, I don't understand how MtG still has a pro scene at all at this point.

>>46911729

DING DING DING.

You'd get a prize, but you're shit.

Anyway, that's exactly it. The overwhelming majority of people doesn't give a fuck about the "BIG NAMES IN THE PRO CIRCUIT." You can just as easily generate hype and interest by having someone local. Hell, someone local might even work better.

You people assume that WotC and Hasbro give a fuck about tournaments. They do, but only in the sense that it will make them money. If tournaments stop being profitable, they're gonna turn it from a card game to a card collection, and call it a day.

>>46912551

Bullshit. I've been playing casually since 5th. I still remember reading inQuest magazine, and skipping over those articles, because I didn't give a shit.

What I cared about was the group of Magic players in my store, The Stand.

>>46923450
>You people assume that WotC and Hasbro give a fuck about tournaments.

They do give a fuck about tournaments. eSports are all the fucking rage these days, and Hearthstone is seriously eating into MtG's profit margins because Blizzard isn't as utterly retarded when it comes to promotion and marketing as WotC is. Tournaments mean viewers which means advertising, and tons of people who think "Hey, I could totally do this, and these guys make tens/hundreds of thousands of dollars if they win! I'm gonna go out and buy me some cards!"

>>46923539

Nice cherry picking, cuntwipe. I said "They do, but only if it makes them money."

Clearly, if they're cutting down on these fuccboi's paychecks, then they're NOT making them enough money.

>>46920441
Pokemon is actually doing pretty well right now. The top prices are scholarships, so it's definitely aimed at a younger audience, but it's not a failed game.

>>46923311
what is good for wizards isn't good for me. unless you're a wizard's shareholder you shouldn't give a fuck about their bottom line

>>46920441
>Without a thriving secondary market magic would be just like other failed games, like pokemon and yugioh.
Nigga u wot.
Pokemon and YGO are still among the top 5 most sold collectible games and MtG, YGO and Pokemon have been top 1, 2 and 3 for the card games for years.
Hell, if you count Asia in, YGO completely shit on MtG and Pokemon will always be successful simply because POKEMON.

>>46912551
>They appeared on fucking creature cards for fuck's sake.
Yeah. You know how they stopped doing that? Because Wizards wisely decided to stop building a personality cult around Pro Players. If you try to build a cult of personality around complete cuntrags, it eventually backfires and it did just that. I mean, how many high profile pros or even Hall of Fame members have been caught matchfixing or outright cheating? Every time that happens, it makes Wizards look retarded and MtG look stupid. Hence why its better to have no names attached.
What matters are the high profile tournaments, because that's what the casual crowd looks up to.

>>46923375
I thought it was going into effect next season.

>>46923450
>You people assume that WotC and Hasbro give a fuck about tournaments.
They give a fuck, but only about Limited and Standard, which is why the are shifting as much support as possible over there.

>>46924719
Yugioh and Pokemon do not have nearly the amount of support magic does, at least in the states. I've never heard of a Yugioh or Pokemon FNM in my area, not because people don't own cards or won't play but because there is no financial incentive for stores to do so. They're not going to sell any product for those games so why bother? In the U.S. there are dozens of GP's, SCG Opens, and State championships every year, not to mention all the Pro Tour Qualifier stuff. Yugioh has nationals and worlds and thats it. Idk about Pokemon, I've never even heard of them having regional qualifier type events. The point is magic has a lot of tournament support because there is a financial incentive to do so.

>>46924891
At least in Europe there's a shitton of stores putting out at least one or two YGO and Pokemon events a week and every single LGS carrying cards carries Pokemon and YGO. Hell, even places that aren't LGSs like GameStop or even your random allround store carries them.

>>46920865
You're a fucking moron.

>>46924792
It goes into effect next season, which is when the people who have busted their asses to make platinum would actually see return on that effort. People who lock up Platinum this season get the benefits next year, not this year. So anyone who worked to reach Platinum this season expecting to be able to collect their $3000 appearance fees at the Pro Tour have had the rug pulled out from under them and no longer have that money to look forward to.

If WotC had kept the current structure in place for the people who achieved Plat this season, and then implemented the changes starting the season after that, this would be significantly less of an issue. Still incredibly shitty, and still rendering a professional magic career impossible, but it would have at least honored the promises they made to the current platinum pros.

>>46925026
Well yeah they carry some sealed product, but what I'm talking about is singles. No stores in my area carry Yugioh singles and only one of them carries pokemon singles, mostly older stuff of value to collectors. Without a thriving singles market it becomes incredibly hard to build competitive decks and grind weekly tournaments, so no one even bothers to run them. I talked to the manager of my main store and he said he'd never carry yugioh singles because of the shit way the banlist is managed and their reprint policy, he could rip open ten boxes of the newest set and find out the next week that the money rares are getting banned or printed as an intro pack promo.

If there are no Magic pros then how will I know what cards I should overpay for?

>>46920935
It's public opinion. If someone wants to pay for it, they will. People are paid a to cover the lives of drug addled musician so, overpaid athletes, and stressed out movie stars, not to mention the money people spend of cds, movie stars, and sports tickets.

How is picking what you want to watch on twitch any different? Is it more sad that a twitch streamer can make money, a panhandler can make money, or a golf pro man make money?

>>46924719
>What matters are the high profile tournaments, because that's what the casual crowd looks up to.

That's not how sport works. If the football World Cup was full of shit teams like Madagascar and San Marino and USA then it wouldn't be special anymore.

Nobody wants to see a Magic tournament full of literally whos that limped through a qualifier because the real pros couldn't afford to show up. We want to see LSV and Finkel and that guy who keeps choking against Israelis.

>pro magic is dead
I fucking wish. In reality all this means is pro players are about to get browner and skinnier.

>>46925223
The secondary market is pretty irrelevant to YGO and Pokemon, though. They are still thriving games with weekly events. The stores just sell mostly sealed product.
For the singles buying and trading with other players is more than enough. MKM gets you every card for YGO and Pokemon in Europe.

Yeah, Stores don't really carry Pokemon Singles (they DO carry YGO ones), but what really matters is the sealed product. As long as that sells, stores will carry it and stores will support it. Hell, vendors fucking LOVE the Gold Series and all the premium shit Pokemon puts out.

>>46900067
>pro players
>the "head" of the "beast"
And yet 90% of Wizards' income comes from casual players.

>>46925487
To most people watching those streams, pro players are already literally whos. Nobody gives a shit about them.

>>46925548
If they didn't give a shit they wouldn't be watching

>>46925510
Why browner?

>>46925516
this, wizards has never actually given a singular fuck about anyone other then the casuals.

>>46925512
>The secondary market is pretty irrelevant to YGO and Pokemon, though. They are still thriving games with weekly events. The stores just sell mostly sealed product.
Why the fuck do people comment on games they don't play?

YGO's singles are so high because no one opens boosters compared to MTG from the lack of limited environments. To say that YGO has no big secondary market of all fucking things.

>>46925516
>make a million dollars
>loose 1/10 of that.
> Oh thats nothing, literally nothing, this doesn't effect me at all.
>be a 100,000$ shorter.

This is how dumb you sound.

Also buyouts before tours prove how wrong you are.

>>46925516
>And yet 90% of Wizards' income comes from casual players.

Make that 99,9%

>>46925516
>casual players

more like kids who buy packs from Wallmart
casual players spend less on Magic product than competitive players

>>46925645
If you think 1/10 of their profits come from 34 fucking platinum players who don't actually pay for cards you are functionally retarded.

The major short-term issue for professional players is that WotC are implementing the changes mid-season. Those who have already achieved platinum this season budgeted for their £12K stipend (which begins the following season) and are now ~$11K in the hole. This is what WotC needs to rectify immediately to stop the revolt.

In terms of player benefits in general it's clear that WotC are moving away from supporting enfranchised professionals directly (both Platinum Players and HoF members) in favour of modestly increasing prize pools and pocketing the difference. The changes come on the back of their CEO leaving and despite continued record revenues for the game. The result may be a more regional rather than international makeup to the players of a given GP or Pro Tour, and far fewer dedicated grinders outside of the US.

It's been suggested that WotC are doing this ahead of loosening the rules on 3rd party sponsorship, but it's difficult to see where big sponsors would come from given second-tier Hearthstone streamers get more viewers than even the Pro Tour. Seems more likely in general that Magic will become a more casual-oriented game that's comparatively US-centric on the world stage.

>>46925630
I'm sorry, I should have said: Stores selling singles are pretty irrelevant, because that's what I meant.
At least around here, the economy is playerdriven.

>>46925690
You're retarded if you think the popularity of Magic is sustainable without a healthy competitive play scene. That's the single thing Magic has going over it's numerous rivals

>>46925746
Stores don't bother selling YGO singles because of
>Theft
>Volatility of prices
The second requires someone to be really goddamn knowledgeable to be working there because YGO singles can jump from $50 to 50 cents over night and vice-versa due to reprints and power creep.

>>46925690
It comes from the fans who see and strive to hit pro or at least want to enter a tourney, buy out a specific card from the market and subsequently the price is driven up.

You can't see why you’re wrong and you intentionally ignore other points in this thread that state the obvious problem with all of this.

When pros get fucked over and can't play, when people stop buying out cards before a pro tour and secondary market dealers (who are literally married at the hip with wizards right now.) stop cracking booster boxes open to fill their stock, then what happens to the market as a whole?

TL;DR get some fucking reading comprehension, and stop pretending to be retarded.

>>46925722
I think the idea that this is a reaction to the judge lawsuit makes a lot of sense. I would not be surprised in the least if they had a legal team go over every interaction they have with players and make sure to end any programs that could even remotely be construed as employment. Paying people $11k a year to show up to your tournaments would throw up one hell of a red flag.

>>46925809
That doesn't really go against my point, though.

Also, theft of singles isn't an issue around here. Nobody breaks into LGSs, probably because this is the heartland of Europe.

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>>46925817
>Why do you play magic
>Because when I grow up I wanna make less than minimum wage
>People like Pat "Slit a mans throat and smuggled drugs" Chapin are my hero
>Just look at magic players, kids everywhere take one look at people who look like this and think I hope this is me one day.

>>46925516
But don't you think we need the Pros at the top?

Doesn't the NBA sell basketballs? They don't manufacture them obviously, but who would give two shits about playing without Michael Jordan?

Same goes for Pro tour. Who gives a shit about spoiler season and mythics without the Pro's to abuse them? Sure, standard might survive but who the fuck is gonna spend a dime on another Modern Masters pack after this?

I think I understand Hasbro's thinking here but the short term benefit is nothing compared to the long term damage.

>>46925943
Holy fuck someone teach Tom Ross how to smile

>>46926165

Smiles are for plebs

>>46926266
>Tom Ross plays infect in every format
>Not a pleb
pick one

>>46925943

Surprisingly people still look up too and want to be said people, but please tell me more about how mystic voodoo effects market prices and how tourneys and by extension pro tourneys don't encourage buyouts.

>>46926317
Winning affects market prices.

People aren't running out to buy some former hall of famer's 0-6 day 1 drop deck.

>>46925817
>>46926317
Prize pools make people want to be a pro. The only thing a popular professional player can do is bring in said viewers.
Honestly with the exception of LSV, Finkel, or Kibler no one gives a shit about 90% of hall of famers let alone some retard in platinum.

>>46924719
>If you try to build a cult of personality around complete cuntrags, it eventually backfires and it did just that. I mean, how many high profile pros or even Hall of Fame members have been caught matchfixing or outright cheating?

this pretty much summaries why pro gaming communities are bullshit

Decision was overturned by Wizards because of the professional and casual shitstorm. They are restoring benefits for the 2016-2017 platinum players, and are keeping the worlds prizepool at 250k.

>>46925943
Why is everybody calling Chapin a criminal? What did he do?

>>46926720
Source?

>>46926762
http://magic.wizards.com/articles/archive/news/announcement-concerning-changes-pro-club-2016-04-26

>>46926720
>What did he do?

Big-time ecstasy dealer.
The guy that was going to testify against him died under mysterious circumstances, or so I am told.

>>46925487
>Nobody wants to see a Magic tournament full of literally whos that limped through a qualifier because the real pros couldn't afford to show up.

then how is pro level play any different than something like WWE at the end of the day if it's always the same people at the top?

>>46926423
Without appearance fees nobody can afford to be a pro, so the prize pools don't matter

>>46926808
How could you be this retarded?

>>46926808
Well Wrestling is scripted to have them at the top while Magic in theory is not and there's always a chance of some pro tour newbies making it to the top.

>>46926808
There wouldn't be much of a difference, aside from MTG wouldnt be staged. Theres still actually room for upward movement. Just look at Shahar Shenhar, winning worlds 2 years in a row. Can't just fluke your way through that.

>>46926720
>Chapin
Literally an interstate drug trafficker who might have killed a guy. He did time in prison, he talks about in podcasts sometimes. He can't go to Japan because they don't let convicted felons into the country.

>>46925618
Something something work outside because no marketable skills.

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>caving in to "pro" players instead of people who wanted the reserved list removed or more staple reprints

>>46928632
just use proxies faggit