Cool change
May 15th 2011 01:33
When my mama asks me will I change,
I tell her yeah, but it’s clear I’ll always be the same.
-- Tupac Shakur, “Until the End of Time”
I’ve been reading recently about the concept of a Living Card Game (LCG), where the contents of booster packs are not randomized and every card can be obtained by buying a known booster pack. After we pause briefly to laugh at me for only now learning about something that’s existed for almost three years, there’s something more interesting to discuss: the fact that this idea might be a significant threat to traditional trading card games, including Magic.
Yes, the cards are somewhat less collectable because you always know which booster or starter has the ones you want. Yes, this would completely eliminate booster draft or sealed deck as a form of play. Yes, this doesn’t entirely spare you from price issues, as the publisher can theoretically raise the price of a starter that contains a Jace the Mind Sculptor equivalent to $100. But it eliminates the competitive and cutthroat aspects of card acquisition – predatory trading behavior is impossible, and it is much more difficult for a vendor like Star City Games to control singles prices.
The LCG concept came up recently in a Magic conversation on a different site, and was dismissed because of the lower collectability and lower number of boosters sold, which was taken to mean lower profitability and thus lower support from the company. But unlike some other supposed market changers, dismissing the LCG phenomenon is a sign of complacency, not foresight. Being common (by the standards of collectables, anyway) or available in complete sets does not make something less unique or collectable – look at Panini’s FIFA World Cup stickers and trading cards, or any of the themed editions of Monopoly. The Game of Thrones LCG has high-quality artwork like Magic’s.
Consider how many potential players are wary of randomized distribution and see it as a way to make cards arbitrarily harder to find. Consider how many current players are finding it hard to fit Magic into their personal finances, and how many of them are becominng disgusted by the fact that the influence of competitive play turns the singles market into a death sport. Consider that Game of Thrones and Call of Cthulhu, the first two LCGs, actually started off as trading card games like Magic but changed in 2008, and were able to maintain and even expand their audience. Can we afford not to take the LCG concept seriously?
I tell her yeah, but it’s clear I’ll always be the same.
-- Tupac Shakur, “Until the End of Time”
I’ve been reading recently about the concept of a Living Card Game (LCG), where the contents of booster packs are not randomized and every card can be obtained by buying a known booster pack. After we pause briefly to laugh at me for only now learning about something that’s existed for almost three years, there’s something more interesting to discuss: the fact that this idea might be a significant threat to traditional trading card games, including Magic.
Yes, the cards are somewhat less collectable because you always know which booster or starter has the ones you want. Yes, this would completely eliminate booster draft or sealed deck as a form of play. Yes, this doesn’t entirely spare you from price issues, as the publisher can theoretically raise the price of a starter that contains a Jace the Mind Sculptor equivalent to $100. But it eliminates the competitive and cutthroat aspects of card acquisition – predatory trading behavior is impossible, and it is much more difficult for a vendor like Star City Games to control singles prices.
The LCG concept came up recently in a Magic conversation on a different site, and was dismissed because of the lower collectability and lower number of boosters sold, which was taken to mean lower profitability and thus lower support from the company. But unlike some other supposed market changers, dismissing the LCG phenomenon is a sign of complacency, not foresight. Being common (by the standards of collectables, anyway) or available in complete sets does not make something less unique or collectable – look at Panini’s FIFA World Cup stickers and trading cards, or any of the themed editions of Monopoly. The Game of Thrones LCG has high-quality artwork like Magic’s.
Consider how many potential players are wary of randomized distribution and see it as a way to make cards arbitrarily harder to find. Consider how many current players are finding it hard to fit Magic into their personal finances, and how many of them are becominng disgusted by the fact that the influence of competitive play turns the singles market into a death sport. Consider that Game of Thrones and Call of Cthulhu, the first two LCGs, actually started off as trading card games like Magic but changed in 2008, and were able to maintain and even expand their audience. Can we afford not to take the LCG concept seriously?
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