The time has come for our first look at an actual Double Masters 2022 box opening! Good Morning Magic recently featured a Double Masters 2022 Box opening, including a Booster Box and a Collector Booster Box. With how excited this set has been in singles spoilers, there’s a lot to unpack here as we’re forced down to Earth a bit. Spoiler: this set isn’t the dream that everyone thought it was.
The Overlooked Rares
We know from the crazy spoilers that a ton of value is nestled into these Double Masters 2022 boxes. The excitement for the more financially attractive reprints makes it easy to forget about some less interesting ones. It’s safe to say that this Double Masters 2022 Draft Booster was on the weaker side of things, but even then, are you going to get a fair return on these boxes? There are some excellent cards seen, like a Smothering Tithe and a Mana Drain, but with the massive hike in price for these boxes, do you think the cards opened here would retail for $400 on the secondary market? If you’re not sure, check the YouTube comments.
The other surprising thing highlighted by this box was how focused this set is for Commander players. There are a ton of Commander reprints featured throughout. Even the less exciting reprints have a good spot in Commander. For constructed players looking to find some value, you may be better off waiting for the effects of this product to hit the secondary market and buying singles. This feels like a set aimed at Limited players and Commander players who like the better things in life, and that’s ok.
The Rise of the Collector Booster
We said it before, but the Double Masters 2022 Collector Booster box may be the better deal for the time being. Because of the negative criticism around the box only featuring four packs, it’s been pretty overlooked on the secondary market. This video may change things, and it looks like it has. These boxes are currently on an upward trend that doesn’t show signs of slowing down. This box retails for $275, and Gavin showed off some insane hits! Seeing the full-art foil Dockside Extortionist in all its glory is worth watching the whole video for. Many of the less attractive Rares in the set don’t have etched and full-art treatments, making these hits feel stronger on average.
These Double Masters 2022 pack openings also bring up some important questions. The biggest of which is: should Commons and Uncommons really be inside $100 card packs? I can understand some foil full-art Uncommons if those slots need to be filled, but if you’re going to spend this much for one pack of cards, I would rather have another rare slot, even if just one. Some fantastic full art commons are available like Monastery Swiftspear. Even focusing on some of those full-arts for Common slots is preferred to a slew of random foil Commons. For this to be done correctly, there would need to be more full-art Commons available to prevent a flooding of the few available full-art Commons onto the marketplace. This event happened when Constellation Foils were featured in the Theros, Beyond Death Collector Boosters. Still, I would hope that for a box with only four packs in it, we would experience something more memorable.
Is this by Design?
Wizards of the Coast has gone out of its way to promote the Collector Booster product lately. With the release of New Capenna’s Commander Prebuilt decks, we saw the introduction of sample Collector Booster Packs for the first time. Baldur’s Gate’s Collector Boosters were a complete miss but were quickly followed up with what may end up being the niche homerun product that Collector Boosters were supposed to be. This is the first time in MTG history where a Collector Booster’s identity as a premium product has been subverted. When Dominaria United releases and the order of Draft Booster and Collector Booster are reverted to their original financial roles, will there be any more changes?
Wizards keep trying to break the mold by introducing new types of products, but MTG may need a unique experience accessible to everyone. This would allow Wizards to create a new target audience for sales and allow us as consumers to experience something new related to the game we already love. Only then do we get the chance to humble brag about the state of our favorite game.