A lot of MTG players, including myself, initially got MTG Foundations wrong. Core sets translate to snooze fests for any established fans, and that’s what MTG Foundations appeared to be. Before spoiler season started, a lot of players were sleeping on this set, and past precedent made that seem sensible.
Compared to normal premier sets, core sets typically lack complexity and big meta-shifting bombs. When the first Foundations spoilers were revealed, it seemed this trend was going to continue. Once the set’s spoiler season began in earnest, however, players were wowed.
For better or worse, around 50% of MTG Foundations’ cards are mechanically unique. On top of this, many of the reprints Wizards picked out are seriously strong, and may massively shift Standard. Add on the fact that Foundations Jumpstart cards are eternal legal, and there’s a ton to be excited about.
To put it lightly, MTG Foundations looks a lot better than expected. While this may have a lot of players excited now, this tidbit may also cause major problems down the line. Due to lackluster appeal at first, stores may have skimped on ordering product at first. Potentially, this may cause things to get very expensive very soon.
MTG Foundations Collector Booster Boxes Explode
MTG Foundations Collector Booster box prices are rising fast. Over the last two weeks, Collector Booster boxes have increased from $217 a box to $270 prior to prerelease weekend. While sales suggested that boxes could keep going up, recent sales make it very difficult to predict where boxes will go from here. Post-pre-release, this still rings true. Collector Booster boxes are now floating around the $280 range.
Interestingly, MSRP for these boxes, according to Wizards of the Coast, is $300 a pop. We’re not quite there yet, but considering how much these boxes have risen in price, that may not be a far cry from reality one day.
To mirror this, Mana Foil and Fracture Foil cards from MTG Foundations are insanely expensive. Fracture Foil Llanowar Elves are selling for $300 at the time of writing. The least expensive Fracture Foil, Think Twice, still retails for about $100.
Popular Mana Foil cards are also going for a pretty penny. Sire of Seven Deaths is retailing for about $120. This is the most expensive of the Mana Foils, but quite a few others are going for around the $100 mark.
What Happened?
After talking to some local game stores in my area and cross-referencing that with what is being said online, it seems like errors were made when predicting the demand for MTG Foundations. The set is way more exciting than it seemed when stores and distributors had to make their orders for the set.
Local game stores and distributors had to place their initial orders for MTG Foundations before a majority of the spoilers were released. This is not unusual. In fact, that’s why MTG sets have ‘First Look’ events before spoiler season starts. It allows stores to get a taste of what an MTG set is about so they can make decisions about how much to order.
As we mentioned earlier, the First Look for MTG Foundations made it look rather meh. Very few cards were spoiled, and the new cards we did see looked mediocre at best. It seemed like medium-powered reprints were going to be this set’s focus, which didn’t appeal to a lot of players.
Following the MTG Foundations First Look, neither players, store owners, nor distributors appeared to be that excited. As a result, it seems many stores didn’t order too much MTG Foundations product, as it appeared to be a flop. Fast forward to MagicCon: Las Vegas, however, and the script was flipped.
All of a sudden MTG players couldn’t get enough of this upcoming set. This might seem like a good thing for Wizards, but initial orders for distributors and stores were already locked in. Sadly, these orders may not have been enough to meet the new demand from excited players.
Unsurprisingly, as often happens when supply doesn’t meet demand, this disconnect has caused prices to spike. Not only are many MTG Foundations cards getting rather expensive, but sealed product is spiking hard. Even Play Booster boxes have spiked from $120 to $137 this past month. Depending on which way the future goes, this could make MTG Foundations a problematically expensive set.
What About Reprintings?
This is where things get… weird. MTG Foundations is going to be Standard legal for at least five years. This is something that players and MTG business owners have never seen before. Given this long lifespan, it seems inevitable that MTG Foundations is going to have multiple print runs to meet continued demand every year.
For this reason, some players are very leery of investing in Play Booster boxes of MTG Foundations. Should the set be massively reprinted, the supply may soon outweigh demand, bringing sealed prices down significantly. This would be a very good thing if you ask us. MTG Foundations is meant to be the latest and greatest entry point into MTG and it’ll fail at that goal if it’s too expensive for new players.
Since Collector Boosters are, as the name suggests, collectible, reprinting them frequently isn’t nearly as imperative. If players just want cards as game pieces, then Play Boosters exist, after all. With this in mind, as well as the nature of collectability, it’s entirely possible that Collector Boosters don’t ever get reprinted.
Should this happen, or rather not happen, MTG Foundations Collector Boosters may become remarkably expensive. Demand for fancy versions of staple cards is always around in MTG, after all. Considering the expected low print volume of Foundations, Collector Boosters, and the cards within, might be even more expensive than usual.
In theory, there is a non-zero chance that MTG Foundations Collector Boosters will be reprinted eventually. Given that there’s bound to be demand for this product, it may even be in Wizards’ best interest to do so. That being said, historically, it’s believed that Collector Boosters are rarely reprinted, so that may be a line in the sand.
Ultimately, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens. Right now, there’s no telling which way the future will go, or even how expensive MTG Foundations will end up being. What we do know, however, is that Wizards has some serious room for improvement to make sure this doesn’t happen again.
What to Improve
At the end of the day, this problem lies squarely on Wizards of the Coast’s shoulders. The First Look for MTG Foundations was a flop and should have been handled much better, in hindsight. Given what we know now, it’s baffling that Wizards didn’t talk up the fact that 50% of the set is new mechanically unique cards.
Realistically, Wizards of the Coast does have to manage hype, as overprinting a product isn’t great for business, either. That said, the wrong balance seems to have been struck this time around, and it could have long-lasting effects that ruin this product’s launch and effectiveness. We can only hope that Wizards of the Coast will do better in the future.
