Yesterday, Wizards of the Coast updated MTG players on all things Arena. Revealing an updated reprint policy while teasing social features and new anthologies, the latest State of the Game livestream didn’t disappoint. Well, that’s true outside of the discussions around the game’s economy, at least.
Sadly, the economy of MTG Arena isn’t just a small part of the game, and it has long been the source of complaints. Ever since MTG Arena first launched, way back in 2019, players haven’t exactly been happy with it. Now, thanks to changes to the MTG release calendar, the MTG Arena economy may be getting even worse. It may only be a matter of time before we reach a breaking point.
No Dust, No Dice
During the State of the Game livestream, Wizards explicitly addressed one of the most talked-about requests for MTG Arena. Since the game’s inception, players have been asking for a card dusting system or a wildcard exchange program. Sadly, no matter how much it gets requested, such a system isn’t on the cards for Arena, as Wizards decided against it very early on.
Wizards’ philosophy for this move makes a lot of sense, in theory. As Chris Kiritz explained within the Weekly MTG livestream, Wizards doesn’t want the economy to be destructive. Dusting, especially, can be a slippery slope as players rush to build a new deck or new cards. Before too long, this can cripple your card collection, eventually turning players away entirely.
With this in mind, it seems sensible that WotC wants players to keep their collections wholly intact. That being said, it’s incredibly rare that most MTG players will use every single card in their collection. Not only are there plenty of rare and mythic duds that aren’t competitively viable, but players have preferences too.
Personally, I don’t like playing blue, so I could easily get by without the vast majority of the blue cards in my collection. Given the option, I would gladly dust most of blue cards I own to give myself extra resources that I’d actually use. While this process is destructive, it’d be my decision to make, and I’d have to deal with any potential consequences.
Admittedly, while dusting would work very well for me, it’s by no means a perfect system. When it’s the only resource in a game, it can encourage bad decisions when new cards come out. Should dust be implemented alongside existing wildcards, however, then players would have the best of both worlds.
Suspect Standard
At the moment, as nice as it would be, MTG Arena doesn’t really need a dust or wildcard exchange system. As Wizards of the Coast pointed out in their State of the Game article, the Arena economy is fairly sound right now. Recent improvements have pushed the game in the right direction, and everything seems fairly balanced for most players.
Looking ahead, however, 2025 is going to get very busy very fast. This year, we’re getting six Standard legal sets on Arena, and many of their release dates are rather close together. The Final Fantasy set, for instance, launches on June 10th on MTG Arena, and Edge of Eternities comes out just seven weeks later on July 29th.
As you can imagine, this doesn’t give MTG players long to Draft this set and collect cards from it. According to Wizards, however, this isn’t a problem since we’ve got the three-year Standard rotation right now. Technically, this gives players a long time to collect the cards they’d want, but Magic doesn’t really work that way.
Whether you’re a casual or a competitive player, the new cards released with each set are impossible to ignore. There are either fun new legendary creatures to build around or powerful new meta-breaking cards needing crafting. The more sets released each year, the more these cards will exist, and the more wildcards get spent.
While the MTG Arena economy may be running smoothly now, players are getting two more sets than usual throughout 2025. This is going to put additional strain on the existing system. Even if things are balanced right now, the scales are steadily being tipped in a worrying direction. We can only hope that Wizards will refine the balance when this seemingly inevitable problem arises.
No Hope for Optimism?
Even if things are balanced currently, it’s clear that MTG Arena will need economy improvements before long. This could manifest as more cards within store packs, increased frequency of finding wildcards, or even just better event rewards. Ultimately, looking ahead, it’s clear that players need something, ideally sooner rather than later.
Sadly, as much as MTG Arena economy improvements are highly requested and would be nice, we doubt anything will happen. So long as having six sets in one year doesn’t break everything, Wizards seems happy with the current system. As much as we’d like it, Wizards isn’t in the business of making MTG Arena more free-to-play friendly just for fun.
Essentially, Wizards of the Coast is a business, so MTG Arena has to be profitable. While some concessions can be made to improve player positivity and increase player retention, the game will never be truly free. That being said, it seems Wizards isn’t leaving players out to dry.
During the State of the Game livestream, Wizards discussed potential social features, such as collection sharing and a sandbox mode. Both these features could allow players to properly test decks before spending their limited wildcards. Sadly, while these features would be very nice to have, they’re not confirmed and won’t be coming until late 2025 at the earliest.
Ultimately, the MTG Arena economy is honestly in a rather worrying spot, given what’s coming up. Even if things are fine right now, there’s the potential for problems in the not-so-distant future. Thankfully, these aren’t guaranteed to happen, but the writing seems to be on the wall somewhat. We can only hope that Wizards will be proactive in finding a solution if required.