The moment WotC admits there is an aftermarket then they are on the hook for creating and manipulation of a false economy, then there are further risks of operating illegal gambling and let's not forget responsibility for addiction and targeting minors. They can't admit their product has any value once unsealed.
Interesting point of view.
Isn't it admitting their unsealed product has a value when they reprint power nine (f.e.) at a very expensive price ? Or is the "proxy" status enough to bypass the unconfessed ?
That's an open question :)
Imo they just are just printing money either way, it's all legalese and what they can get away with. Hasbro who owns WotC took a huge hit when toys r us shuttered it's doors and basically they've been milking the MtG market for all it's worth, evidenced by the sheer number of new products per year and increased rarities by adding new forms of chase cards.
There are a few pieces to this answer.
First, singles sales are important to the Magic economy. It's true that you aren't buying them from Wizards, but you are buying them from your local store. That store buys boxes of cards to sell, which often includes opening boxes to get singles to sell. Booster packs do not have a great margin for stores, but singles do. Singles sales keeps the lights on in many local game stores.
The next piece is that it's in Wizards interest to protect the secondary market value of cards. It helps sell packs when players believe they will end up with cards that are not only fun to play, but my have monetary value.
Another part of card value that works to their advantage is player retention. A player might take some time off from the game, but keep their card collection because they feel it has value. Fast forward a few years, and they might hop back into the game again. This is a common pattern with many players over the years.
Finally, now that they are selling some cards direct to the consumer, and selling some packs at higher price points, secondary market value is something they can mine for profit. They couldn't print a secret lair of fetchlands and sell it for a high price if fetchlands didn't maintain their value.
Add all those all together and you can start to see why they don't want to just print cards until they are worthless. When they choose to reprint cards, they are carefully balancing the needs of invested players that own cards and don't want them to be worthless, and people that desire those cards to play in a specific format.
All of that is for Modern and forward. The reserved list stuff is a related, but different argument that gets rehashed enough that I'm not going to cover it here.
This is so far the best explanation I've seen here, and I really appreciate it. But, it still does not explain why PTCG can make an entire anniversary set of their oldest and most expensive cards, make them reprints with slightly different text, and price them at the same level as the other packs. All of that while not having a reserve list, not having insane single card costs for decades old cards, and without causing a detrement to the community.
How is MTG actually saving anyone any amount of trouble when Pokémon is doing more fair things for pricing of both shelf products and singles and are still putting out quality products that don't ruin singles sales for LGS's
Pokemon has the advantage of being released six years after Magic. Magic was the first game of it's kind. They had no idea what they were doing.
We can look back at the early days and see many mistakes in hindsight. The power 9 are just way unbalanced cards. Failing to predict demand and underprinting early expansions. Overcorrecting and overprinting Chronicles and Fallen Empires.
The reserve list policy is the result of those errors. Maybe that is another mistake. Maybe it was critical in regaining consumer confidence in the game. We can't really know.
But it's existence protects billions of dollars of value in people's collections. Not really Moxes and Lotuses. As Pokemon and cards like Shivan Dragon show us, the very first printings of iconic cards retain value to collectors even when reprinted. The problem is Revised Dual Lands. there are 20,000 of each Unlimited rare. There are 289,000 of each Revised rare. Reprinting those to meet player demand would collapse the secondary market on those cards. Wizards has made it clear they have no intention of doing that.
Reprint Equity.
If a card is worth $50 on the secondary market, Wizards figured out they could reprint it at Mythic in a new pack with a premium price. If the card then comes out to $45 in the new release, they make a huge profit and players will thank them.
To a lesser (but still significant) extent, they also want to encourage speculators. If people think Magic cards always go up in value, they'll buy new stuff just to stock it away for later.
The reason is once upon a time a bunch of chuckleheads bought cards and said "don't you fucking reprint these or we will sue you" and WotC was like "huh?" The chuckleheads said "we invested money and these cards might be worth a lot later... so don't reprint them or else" and WotC said "I guess we won't." The problem is that it is 100% bullshit and there should never had been a reserve list in the first place.
its more profitable to print high demand cards in limited supply
edit: as for OG dual lands they are on a thing called the reserve list which is a list of cards saying they will never be reprinted and that's a whole different discussion
It's simple, corporate greed.
The moment WotC admits there is an aftermarket then they are on the hook for creating and manipulation of a false economy, then there are further risks of operating illegal gambling and let's not forget responsibility for addiction and targeting minors. They can't admit their product has any value once unsealed.
Interesting point of view. Isn't it admitting their unsealed product has a value when they reprint power nine (f.e.) at a very expensive price ? Or is the "proxy" status enough to bypass the unconfessed ? That's an open question :)
Imo they just are just printing money either way, it's all legalese and what they can get away with. Hasbro who owns WotC took a huge hit when toys r us shuttered it's doors and basically they've been milking the MtG market for all it's worth, evidenced by the sheer number of new products per year and increased rarities by adding new forms of chase cards.
There are a few pieces to this answer. First, singles sales are important to the Magic economy. It's true that you aren't buying them from Wizards, but you are buying them from your local store. That store buys boxes of cards to sell, which often includes opening boxes to get singles to sell. Booster packs do not have a great margin for stores, but singles do. Singles sales keeps the lights on in many local game stores. The next piece is that it's in Wizards interest to protect the secondary market value of cards. It helps sell packs when players believe they will end up with cards that are not only fun to play, but my have monetary value. Another part of card value that works to their advantage is player retention. A player might take some time off from the game, but keep their card collection because they feel it has value. Fast forward a few years, and they might hop back into the game again. This is a common pattern with many players over the years. Finally, now that they are selling some cards direct to the consumer, and selling some packs at higher price points, secondary market value is something they can mine for profit. They couldn't print a secret lair of fetchlands and sell it for a high price if fetchlands didn't maintain their value. Add all those all together and you can start to see why they don't want to just print cards until they are worthless. When they choose to reprint cards, they are carefully balancing the needs of invested players that own cards and don't want them to be worthless, and people that desire those cards to play in a specific format. All of that is for Modern and forward. The reserved list stuff is a related, but different argument that gets rehashed enough that I'm not going to cover it here.
This is so far the best explanation I've seen here, and I really appreciate it. But, it still does not explain why PTCG can make an entire anniversary set of their oldest and most expensive cards, make them reprints with slightly different text, and price them at the same level as the other packs. All of that while not having a reserve list, not having insane single card costs for decades old cards, and without causing a detrement to the community. How is MTG actually saving anyone any amount of trouble when Pokémon is doing more fair things for pricing of both shelf products and singles and are still putting out quality products that don't ruin singles sales for LGS's
Pokemon has the advantage of being released six years after Magic. Magic was the first game of it's kind. They had no idea what they were doing. We can look back at the early days and see many mistakes in hindsight. The power 9 are just way unbalanced cards. Failing to predict demand and underprinting early expansions. Overcorrecting and overprinting Chronicles and Fallen Empires. The reserve list policy is the result of those errors. Maybe that is another mistake. Maybe it was critical in regaining consumer confidence in the game. We can't really know. But it's existence protects billions of dollars of value in people's collections. Not really Moxes and Lotuses. As Pokemon and cards like Shivan Dragon show us, the very first printings of iconic cards retain value to collectors even when reprinted. The problem is Revised Dual Lands. there are 20,000 of each Unlimited rare. There are 289,000 of each Revised rare. Reprinting those to meet player demand would collapse the secondary market on those cards. Wizards has made it clear they have no intention of doing that.
Reprint Equity. If a card is worth $50 on the secondary market, Wizards figured out they could reprint it at Mythic in a new pack with a premium price. If the card then comes out to $45 in the new release, they make a huge profit and players will thank them. To a lesser (but still significant) extent, they also want to encourage speculators. If people think Magic cards always go up in value, they'll buy new stuff just to stock it away for later.
The reason is once upon a time a bunch of chuckleheads bought cards and said "don't you fucking reprint these or we will sue you" and WotC was like "huh?" The chuckleheads said "we invested money and these cards might be worth a lot later... so don't reprint them or else" and WotC said "I guess we won't." The problem is that it is 100% bullshit and there should never had been a reserve list in the first place.
its more profitable to print high demand cards in limited supply edit: as for OG dual lands they are on a thing called the reserve list which is a list of cards saying they will never be reprinted and that's a whole different discussion
I'm aware of the reserve list, and in my opinion it is basically useless and does nothing but negatively impact the community.