I still do not understand how I do not get a pack digitally when I buy a pack physically like Pokémon. It’s genius, only makes you a bigger customer and pushes the game more. Positive positive positive. Really hope this means they can stop the money grabbing on Arena.
With Pokemon TCG you can buy codes for pennies, retailers cracking thousands of packs see the codes as just another single to sell undercutting the official store. Still, they have codes that are limited to a few per set per account which they could make more readily available
I feel like you should’ve also read the line about layoffs, it was an important event that deserves to be brought up still to remind us it happened and place the necessary criticism on hasbro
Also the biggest hurdle to commander on arena is adding a live chat. Nobody wants to be responsible for that, that’s why they don’t have it for 1v1, it’s too risky because they can’t moderate it. Opens up so many liability issues they don’t want to deal with
I don't understand why they haven't just gone all-in on readying Arena for commander. I get that there are 27,000 cards in Magic's history, but 90% of these aren't played in commander anyways
@@CloneByDesign the main problem is 25 life is not enough for a longer format. It adds 1 turn, so instead of playing turn 3 standard you play turn 4 Brawl. It just doesn't work.
Early on when the devs were doing random interviews they talked about how after the very first alpha there was a talk about setting aside 6 months to code 4 player in, or just keep the ball rolling and have full release with GRN/RNA/WOTS hype cycle. the huge push for “esports,” even the cringy commercial about they’ll know your name, meant they needed a digital client to make that happen, even if it was not ready for 1v1 tournaments let alone 4 player. They haven’t looked back since and I’m guessing they’ll never shut down arena to make commander arena. Their few million dollar investment into MTGO a couple years ago seemed to be their small effort at online commander
All these big companies pushing for digital is exactly why I'm working on developing a game for tabletop. I'm sick of all these games that push people further and further apart, and I want to bring people back together in person!
I’m ok going digital with a fair amount, I’ll never go digital with magic. I may play a deck or two on Arena, but I do not plan to actually buy cards I don’t own. They shut down the site or you lose your account for any reason and you can say good-bye to your entire collection.
I’m with you, Mitch! It’s a ridiculous ask for Hasbro to have players assume the risk of investing in a temporary license for digital cards. Seen the negative effects digital “ownership” has had on the video games and entertainment industries a lot in recent years- Hasbro would really have to provide some serious value here to get me even remotely interested in a digital commander platform. Even still, it would only ever be a secondary option to playing with physical cards for me personally!
Agreed. The major draw of magic is the social interaction of IRL play. If I'm going to sit at home alone and play a video game I have way better options than MTG.
Hasbro could make so much money having a $10-15 per month subscription on Arena to have access to every card so people can participate in all the formats increasing retention. You could eventually earn the cards to build certain decks but most people would probably stick to the subscription for the convenience which allows them to keep monthly revenues up.
Agreed! Make an Arena 2.0 or something, have a huge launch party or whatever, add every card legal in at least one format, have every major format in the game (including pauper, EDH, cEDH, Standard, Modern, Legacy etc), and have a subscription tier where you pay, realistically, $10-$20/month and just get access to all cards. OR you can play the game as it's designed now and just play for free but grind your ass off for what you want. BUT they would never do that simply because it would decrease the need to buy digital currency and packs etc. Despite player retention skyrocketing if they did that, they wouldn't because they don't want to lose the gambling aspect of it all. They'd rather funnel everyone through "small" repeatable purchases that give you a CHANCE of getting cards you need, and MAYBE in the art style you want.
The only thing to deduce really from this announcement is the clear drop-off of physical merchandising opportunities from their largest partner, Disney, and them transitioning to what has worked in WOTC and digital gaming. That’s it.
one thousand one hundred nine hundred and thirteen cards LMAO PS It was still Extended when the Scars set was out. Pretty sure it change to Modern, in paper, shortly after the M12 release. Modern existed on modo only for like half a year before it officially replaced extended.
They won't be adding Commander to Arena. They built Arena using a temporary dev group in order to save money. Now that most of them are gone, it would be almost impossible to rehire a new group to add Commander. They could hire new people to implement a new format, but they have to relearn the code before even starting.
@@thekurtrussell4007 You're halfway there. Arena uses a rules engine, called the Game Rules Engine (GRE), which manages the core rules of the game, such as tracking priority and handling combat damage, but it does not inherently understand individual cards and interactions. Instead, it delegates these interactions to a secondary system using CLIPS, a language designed for rule-based logic. The GRE works by creating a list of actions or tasks, then taking a "nap" while CLIPS rules modify that list based on the unique abilities of specific cards. This separation ensures scalability, allowing thousands of new cards to be integrated without overcomplicating the system. Now, this is already quite taxing on the system in 1v1. In fact let's face it: Arena feels barely capable of performing this in a 1v1 game. The game feels like it's desperately trying not to explode. Having to manage GRE and CLIPS with 3-4 card interactions in a multiplayer game would require a major overhaul. I'm not saying it's impossible, but a new dev team (and possibly entire game built from scratch) would be required to pull this off.
I'm sure they won't have Commander on MTG Arena for a long time, but since Brawl is very similar, just 1 v 1, they can improve it by adding more cards to the format. I'm sure lots of people would loke to build their IRL Commander decks on Brawl online.
What amazes me the most, beyond the crass consumerism that will run rampant from all this, is that Hasbro/WotC wasn't working on this from day 1. I mean we had computers in 2011 when the commander format started. It's been growing in popularity since then and they've been developing the Arena product from likely some time. How in the heck did they not think or plan to get the commander/legacy/pioneer cards etc. online from day 1 and have the process for multiplayer going? I've been playing online multiplayer games for at least 15 years now, with far greater demand on graphics and server ping than Arena has. It seems short sighted to me given that digital things have been a thing for nearly 25 years now. Anyways, can't wait to start opening my Commander Loot Boxes brought to you by the good folks at Bungie and Blizzard. Yuck.
Hasbro's earnings call is tomorrow. I think this is news from their last earnings call a couple of months ago. It'll be interesting to see what gets shared tomorrow morning.
So many of my cards I got in packs or bought cheap. I could never afford to get them now or on arena. I know they'll never let us add collections to the game since it defeats their monetization. So I would just stick to paper even if they went on arena
Right? XD Cocks acts like he was up till 5am going through lines of code working on his pet project. Larian did all the magical hard work, and it paid off big time.
I play mtgo, and I love it. Always games to join I'm commander and modern, the only formats I play, and it's much cheaper than paper. I wouldn't mind some more love being sent towards the online format that's not arena. 😂😂
I’m curious to see how well the older cards would do on a digital marketplace with all the modern cards’ power creep. Also, pushing digital would be convenient and surely bring in new players, but how is this shift going to affect the LGS? In general, I prefer the tactility of playing with cardboard- can’t see myself going all digital for that reason alone! Just some thoughts. Thanks for sharing this news.
They'll be watching pokemon tcg pocket closely. Decoupling the digital and print cards from each other so they have the freedom to milk you in new and creative ways.
I want free-for-all format!! you build the deck according to other format rules, but the rule set you choose also determines your starting hand and life total. There is no ban list. then you and 1 or more other players slug it out to see who is the victor. Will you face a commander player with your legacy deck? Will your brawl deck face down an explorer deck? Will the freeform deck be broken or will the oath breaker deck reign supreme? Free-for-all format is not yet recognized by Wizards as a format.
That would be a great compromise in my opinion. It would at least force newer and more interesting decks occasionally, although I suspect it would be a lot of brawl lists at first lol Would be neat to see how it evolves over time.
Most people will refuse to pay some type of subscription or have to buy the cards they already own so they can rebuild and play online. They can stop printing physical sets if they want to but that will make paper magic extremely valuable. Basically everything physical is on a new reserved list type of situation. Honestly i really wouldn't mind that. It would be an improvement to having a secret lair or new set release like every other day. We've got 27,000 cards to choose from and that's plenty.
Unless something has changed, I was under the impression that the goal was to get tournament pioneer on arena not full pioneer. Ideally I'd love to get full pioneer but I don't see that happening for awhile.
I fully expect a new Commander Client that will have a different d-base of cards and be separate from Arena. It also means people will need to pay for cards or services (possible sub model) for cards on a different client. WotC has zero fiscal motivation to simply update Arena so we can just use the cards we already have...they won't make any $$$ that way.
Good for them if Hasbro can do something like what Jackbox does. Otherwise they're clearly going for quantity over quality. I wonder if MTG players might have some Winged Wisdom to describe how that works out. When they figure out how to make MTGA support 4 player matches, my group might actually play it more. It's a big change for how they designed it, but I'm still surprised they don't seem to be doing that.
Wonder if they'll have to follow through with some of the legislation being passed that forces acknowledgement and list that anything sold digitally is not ownership but a license. But yeah, Commander is a very in person social game, if it moves digitally you remove the social aspect unless you're using alternative means to communicate. Wouldn't throw it past them to decide one day that they'll sell a "booster pack" that literally is just a card with a code to redeem online for a random selection of cards with worse pull rates.
They have already screwed up some sets on arena by not adding all the cards and merging some like Amonket remastered and shadows/eldrich remastered. Pioneer is still a ways off. I don’t understand why they don’t take original digital programs like Origins and the Magic 2013, 2014,2015 digital games and port some of the cards from them.
If Hasbro wants to be a digital games company, they'd need to do the following at minimum: One, fix the companion app. Two, they'd need to better streamline the coding of MTGA and fix MTGO's issues such as cards just not working. Three, whatever game(s) they release need to be worthwhile as they'll be competing for disk space. Four, realize that they shouldn't compete with themselves for player base unless the games can support split player bases or a core feature that can draw the player base to both games.
So you mention 3 issues with Commander on Arena. Multiplayer, how to get cards, and the card pool. There's definitely a lot of hurdles with getting multiplayer on there but at this point, if they haven't already been ironing out those problems and the coding and developing of this for several years now, whoever is leading the Arena team is an absolute incomplete idiot. The card acquisition issue is easy to fix. All they need to do is add wildcard packs in the shop, which they should have done right from day 1 for constructed players. They'd have to figure out a price that makes sense within the economy but like $2 for 4 rare wildcards or the equivalent in gems. I'd be far happier spending $100 on 200 rares than wasting my time on the stupid lottery of booster packs. It's not like the option would take anything away from limited players or any money away from WotC. Then, the card pool issue is the easiest thing ever to solve. There literally isn't a card pool issue. Give players multiplayer and a convenient way to get cards, and they'll make decks and be more than happy to play with the current card pool. It'll give a completely different meta and make things interesting, and players will get to be excited about the card pool expanding every year from both sides with new sets and old sets and remasters being added. Plus, a smaller card pool is probably better for attracting players to the format from Arena because it's cards they've played and are familiar with and often the massive depth of the commander card pool stifles creativity anyways.
I'm hyped to hear that someone from Blizzard is heading Wotc now. Maybe he'll actually be able to fix Arena and we'll actually be able to play Eternal Formats. I would love more Battle For Baulder's Gate and DnD Sets. I didn't get to buy too much of those 2 products, so another chance to get more Adventures In The Forgotten Reals, would be great. Also I would love to play Commander on Arena. Hopefully they will ditch Alchemy and Finally turn Explorer into full blown Pioneer like they're trying to do. I loved playing Yugioh Master Duel, so they should immulate that digital modle as much as Legally possible. The possibilities here are endless. I just hope that Wotc and Hasbro will be willing to invest the proper resources into making Arena a better MTG experience. I've played a digital version of Cards Against Humanity Online, on my phone, and it was an amazing experience. I would actually like Commander to be separated into teirs. CEDH, Commander, and Pauper Commander as the Teirs. But Pauper Commander is gonna have to be more regulated, and standardized to have only Uncommon Legendaries legal as your Commander, then Wotc could cash in on that by printing more support products for Pauper Commander, and even reprints for CEDH players. The sky is the limit if they do it right.
i Rly hope they make a singel game only with commander. So the special effects and all the veiosions of all cards will be online. So its a combination of arena just foe commander. I would gladly pay 50 dollars for that. and just keep the wild card system there :)
Unless they allow me to build a deck card by card without engaging with the rest of arena, I'm not interested. Also that timer would have to go. Some board states are ridiculous. Speaking of time, extra turn spells would need to be banned on arena.
The only reason I'm still playing EDH is the social and support my LGS and to be honest I'm almost changing to boardgames instead, cheaper and easier to deal with....
I can see Arena going as far back as Modern, but not the older formats. Too big and complicated. Imagine Worldgorger Dragon combo... Discontinuing paper MTG would likely be Hasbro suicide.
I don't hate the idea of aiming to focus on digital, but only if they actually at least give us 4 player on arena. It would be so much easier for me to get multiple friends in to the game if we can just meet online rather than have to put aside all the time to get together for it. Not that I don't prefer everything in person, but its alot easier to sell people to just downloading something and work on gathering cards digitally, rather than trying to sell them on 40 dollar commander starters. Now do I have faith in them to not screw this up..... no, not in the slightest.
As someone who was GRANDMASTER on Overwatch and Overwatch 2, this ceo is this single person that I will attribute to the fall of the game. He came from some soap company into activision where his entire claim to fame was microtransactions that legit killed the franchise. Then he went to blizzard where he basically forced the entire creative directors to quit by installing his friends who are all yes mans in every corner of the company. They had one goal: short term profit through microtransactions. They legit ruined the game. Now they got rid of him because he sucked and he’s at Hasbro in charge of magic?! THIS IS THE TIME TO BOYCOTT THE GAME. HE WILL RUIN IT. HES IN IT FOR TJE MONEY NOT FOR OUR INTERESTS AS PLAYERS.
Be sad if Hasbro removed the social aspect from MTG. It's been my number 1 way to meet new people. People need to engage in face to face interactions, digital interactions can be very unhealthy, and so is living your life indoors or in your bedroom.
All they have to do is release annual Switch game that comes with core set then have $30 DLC for each set in the block. THEN every year re-release last year's game and all sets in the block for $90. So you could buy it all as soon as it launches for $130 or wait until it's about to rotate and save $30 Think how the NBA franchise keeps the core game the same. Some art changes. WotC could do the same. And or course sell boosters on the Nintendo Switch eventually 😊
I see no incentive to blow money on arena packs when you could just use Tabletop Sim and use cards from all of magic history including unsets. Buying physical at least gives you something. I really don't see a point of playing commander on mobile (or in arena on pc) especially given that they don't even have competitive brawl after all these years.
My biggest criticism of magic arena, is and always will be, sunken cost. I have been collecting magic cards since 2012. Hundreds of dollars, and physical cards gifted are sentimental. Starting back at zero sucks. The method to get the cards you want is entirely random. Playing the game is way more limited. I can't play the way I want to play in arena nor play the decks I want to play. And then the time and effort I put into paper or digital don't transfer. The time and effort I take to make a really cool deck on arena will have to be repurchased in real life If I want to play a table top version. Why would i do that when I could just play with the cards I have at my LGS?
Sure, they have to step more into the digital business. But simply porting physical to digital will not be the right way. Look at Lego which is handling the digital transition way better than Hasbro. But also with Lego, you see that when they try to merge the physical and digital experience, they fail (Hidden Side, VIDIYO,...). But when they simply take their brand and create some parallel product, they succeed. Look at the LEGO movies, the LEGO video games, the LEGO TV shows. All of that works and creates synergies to bring kids to the physical toy and vice versa. So, instead of bringing Magic formats like Commander to digital, it makes way more sense to focus on parallel products in the Magic universe. A "Diablo" game in the Magic universe, a strategy game like Master of Magic. These games could be linked to Arena so that you for example can use Magic equipment cards to equip your character. Or use your land cards to improve your cities in the strategy games etc. But it's tricky to do this right and balance it properly. Also, a streaming show or movie in the Magic universe would make an impact (let's see what the Netflix show will bring).
paper magic won't go anywhere. If they were to decide full digital and stop paper magic, proxies will rise and we will play it anyway (but cheaper) so yeah
Better game developing companies have tried this strategy (releasing multiple games per year) with established IP's etc and have failed... this doesn't look good unless they keep the scale and cost of the games low which I DOUBT. Yes there are exceptions but they do not make the rule.
Played MTG Arena, Hated it, I won't be wasting money on that game. I will stick to my cardboard. If they stop making that well they just lost me as a customer and I spend lots of money on cardboard. So, Oh well. Guess I will be saving a bit of money.
Love how they like to mention BG3 which they literally didn’t make and had years to develop with the community before the actual release but ok sure hasbro then the creators dipped out as soon as they could. Plus for magic good luck they already soured many for both little and big things more and more of us are more focused on proxy and singles plus Chris needs to stop talking people really wished he stopped talking
What worries me is people that have grown up playing mostly digital games are coming into positions of influence. They don't know what they're missing and physical games are not as appealing to them. Now this doesn't jive with the popularity of Magic - check out any good game store on a Friday night. But the people that get into leadership and influence positions are not necessarily the same caliber of player. If they play at all. And games like the Monopoly GO game are brain dead black holes without depth or real value. UGH. Hopefully there won't be an impact on physical components like Magic or D&D books.
D&D is bleeding playera due to their move to digital sales, as well as items being included in their PHB like the trigger forms and player safety from scary ideas. People do NOT like these things, and so many other games are benefitting from this. Not sure HOW this might apply to MTG, but this is very forboding for the game we love.
Hasbro is losing its identity by going digital, I am not even sure how they are going to compete against established names in digital games and such. Taking the social aspect out of MTG is a bad move
Hilarious. Following the digital assets trends in selling made up product for the same prices as they did when manufacturing still existed. Basically printing money.
Do you actually believe hasbro cares about anything other than money? An all digital base means no money toward physical product so its free money for share holders. Thats hasbros only goal.
will I play commander on arena, short answer no. long answer also no I have tts and for digital commander i only play it with friends so arena does not at all appeal to me. arena is essentially a gatcha game with the way packs work it would be so insanely expensive to try and build commander decks with the current monetization and I doubt hasbro will want to make it cheaper they want that money.
imo commander will never be playable on mtga. itll not ever be playable on digital as long as winning is as heavily incentiviced as is the case for any mtga format.
Don’t buy micro transactions, buy singles.
At this point I'm all-in on proxies.
Singles are just irl micro transactions
@@Cjtip26 no, because you receive something that you actually own and are able to gift, trade or resell if you wish.
@@Theoszombie understandable.
@@ChronoMoogle proxies are something you can gift own and resell.
I still do not understand how I do not get a pack digitally when I buy a pack physically like Pokémon. It’s genius, only makes you a bigger customer and pushes the game more. Positive positive positive. Really hope this means they can stop the money grabbing on Arena.
With Pokemon TCG you can buy codes for pennies, retailers cracking thousands of packs see the codes as just another single to sell undercutting the official store. Still, they have codes that are limited to a few per set per account which they could make more readily available
That is a good idea, and Wizards generally doesn't have any of those or doesn't use them.
Wizards really should add that. I’m playing Pokemon TCG live more than mtg arena because of this.
Hasbro’s future plans: 💰💰💰💰
hasbro's plans, period.
well ofcause its a company :) 😊
@@110890nick bootlicker.
I feel like you should’ve also read the line about layoffs, it was an important event that deserves to be brought up still to remind us it happened and place the necessary criticism on hasbro
Also the biggest hurdle to commander on arena is adding a live chat. Nobody wants to be responsible for that, that’s why they don’t have it for 1v1, it’s too risky because they can’t moderate it. Opens up so many liability issues they don’t want to deal with
I don't understand why they haven't just gone all-in on readying Arena for commander. I get that there are 27,000 cards in Magic's history, but 90% of these aren't played in commander anyways
for starters they could just make it a 4 player format. would improve the whole thing insanely
I would go to back to Arena if they added commander. Brawl and historic brawl are fine but I like the type of gameplay that 4 players brings.
@@CloneByDesign the main problem is 25 life is not enough for a longer format. It adds 1 turn, so instead of playing turn 3 standard you play turn 4 Brawl. It just doesn't work.
@@blaiscallies4986 I agree.
Early on when the devs were doing random interviews they talked about how after the very first alpha there was a talk about setting aside 6 months to code 4 player in, or just keep the ball rolling and have full release with GRN/RNA/WOTS hype cycle. the huge push for “esports,” even the cringy commercial about they’ll know your name, meant they needed a digital client to make that happen, even if it was not ready for 1v1 tournaments let alone 4 player.
They haven’t looked back since and I’m guessing they’ll never shut down arena to make commander arena. Their few million dollar investment into MTGO a couple years ago seemed to be their small effort at online commander
All these big companies pushing for digital is exactly why I'm working on developing a game for tabletop. I'm sick of all these games that push people further and further apart, and I want to bring people back together in person!
Have you looked into Flesh and Blood? They have refused to make a digital tcg because they want people to play in person at local game stores.
It means we proxy everything
I’m ok going digital with a fair amount, I’ll never go digital with magic. I may play a deck or two on Arena, but I do not plan to actually buy cards I don’t own. They shut down the site or you lose your account for any reason and you can say good-bye to your entire collection.
I’m with you, Mitch! It’s a ridiculous ask for Hasbro to have players assume the risk of investing in a temporary license for digital cards. Seen the negative effects digital “ownership” has had on the video games and entertainment industries a lot in recent years- Hasbro would really have to provide some serious value here to get me even remotely interested in a digital commander platform. Even still, it would only ever be a secondary option to playing with physical cards for me personally!
Agreed. The major draw of magic is the social interaction of IRL play. If I'm going to sit at home alone and play a video game I have way better options than MTG.
As a Dallas Football fan I can tell you what they mean by going “all in“… nothing changes and things will probably get worse
I felt that
Hasbro could make so much money having a $10-15 per month subscription on Arena to have access to every card so people can participate in all the formats increasing retention. You could eventually earn the cards to build certain decks but most people would probably stick to the subscription for the convenience which allows them to keep monthly revenues up.
You’re giving magic fans too much credit, they whine about anything.
@@Noobmaster6900.usually rightfully so when in it comes to hazbro kinda hope they pay less attention to mtg.
Agreed! Make an Arena 2.0 or something, have a huge launch party or whatever, add every card legal in at least one format, have every major format in the game (including pauper, EDH, cEDH, Standard, Modern, Legacy etc), and have a subscription tier where you pay, realistically, $10-$20/month and just get access to all cards. OR you can play the game as it's designed now and just play for free but grind your ass off for what you want. BUT they would never do that simply because it would decrease the need to buy digital currency and packs etc. Despite player retention skyrocketing if they did that, they wouldn't because they don't want to lose the gambling aspect of it all. They'd rather funnel everyone through "small" repeatable purchases that give you a CHANCE of getting cards you need, and MAYBE in the art style you want.
@Doombot2point0 There is the aspect of needing gems for events and drafts so still some need to spend on even with the subscription.
The only thing to deduce really from this announcement is the clear drop-off of physical merchandising opportunities from their largest partner, Disney, and them transitioning to what has worked in WOTC and digital gaming. That’s it.
one thousand one hundred nine hundred and thirteen cards LMAO
PS It was still Extended when the Scars set was out. Pretty sure it change to Modern, in paper, shortly after the M12 release. Modern existed on modo only for like half a year before it officially replaced extended.
3:52 I know this is a Magic channel, but that screams they are finally gonna have an official digital DnD game akin to BG3
They won't be adding Commander to Arena.
They built Arena using a temporary dev group in order to save money. Now that most of them are gone, it would be almost impossible to rehire a new group to add Commander. They could hire new people to implement a new format, but they have to relearn the code before even starting.
This sounds like speculation.
Relearn the code? Like Unity? It’s made with Unity…they already know it. Solved your issue
@@thekurtrussell4007 You're halfway there.
Arena uses a rules engine, called the Game Rules Engine (GRE), which manages the core rules of the game, such as tracking priority and handling combat damage, but it does not inherently understand individual cards and interactions.
Instead, it delegates these interactions to a secondary system using CLIPS, a language designed for rule-based logic. The GRE works by creating a list of actions or tasks, then taking a "nap" while CLIPS rules modify that list based on the unique abilities of specific cards. This separation ensures scalability, allowing thousands of new cards to be integrated without overcomplicating the system.
Now, this is already quite taxing on the system in 1v1. In fact let's face it: Arena feels barely capable of performing this in a 1v1 game. The game feels like it's desperately trying not to explode.
Having to manage GRE and CLIPS with 3-4 card interactions in a multiplayer game would require a major overhaul. I'm not saying it's impossible, but a new dev team (and possibly entire game built from scratch) would be required to pull this off.
I'm sure they won't have Commander on MTG Arena for a long time, but since Brawl is very similar, just 1 v 1, they can improve it by adding more cards to the format. I'm sure lots of people would loke to build their IRL Commander decks on Brawl online.
I had wished for a more easy/accessible commander format. I hope they do that.
What amazes me the most, beyond the crass consumerism that will run rampant from all this, is that Hasbro/WotC wasn't working on this from day 1. I mean we had computers in 2011 when the commander format started. It's been growing in popularity since then and they've been developing the Arena product from likely some time. How in the heck did they not think or plan to get the commander/legacy/pioneer cards etc. online from day 1 and have the process for multiplayer going? I've been playing online multiplayer games for at least 15 years now, with far greater demand on graphics and server ping than Arena has. It seems short sighted to me given that digital things have been a thing for nearly 25 years now. Anyways, can't wait to start opening my Commander Loot Boxes brought to you by the good folks at Bungie and Blizzard. Yuck.
Hasbro's earnings call is tomorrow. I think this is news from their last earnings call a couple of months ago.
It'll be interesting to see what gets shared tomorrow morning.
So many of my cards I got in packs or bought cheap. I could never afford to get them now or on arena. I know they'll never let us add collections to the game since it defeats their monetization. So I would just stick to paper even if they went on arena
me and all my homies play in-person paper Magic only. Playing in person has so many elements that online never could have...
D&D One/Beyond/6/Whatever they're calling it today is probably going to eat a substantial portion of that money.
Hasbro had nothing to do with BG3 though, except that they sold the name
Right? XD Cocks acts like he was up till 5am going through lines of code working on his pet project. Larian did all the magical hard work, and it paid off big time.
I play mtgo, and I love it. Always games to join I'm commander and modern, the only formats I play, and it's much cheaper than paper. I wouldn't mind some more love being sent towards the online format that's not arena. 😂😂
I’m curious to see how well the older cards would do on a digital marketplace with all the modern cards’ power creep. Also, pushing digital would be convenient and surely bring in new players, but how is this shift going to affect the LGS? In general, I prefer the tactility of playing with cardboard- can’t see myself going all digital for that reason alone! Just some thoughts. Thanks for sharing this news.
They'll be watching pokemon tcg pocket closely. Decoupling the digital and print cards from each other so they have the freedom to milk you in new and creative ways.
I want free-for-all format!!
you build the deck according to other format rules, but the rule set you choose also determines your starting hand and life total. There is no ban list.
then you and 1 or more other players slug it out to see who is the victor. Will you face a commander player with your legacy deck? Will your brawl deck face down an explorer deck? Will the freeform deck be broken or will the oath breaker deck reign supreme?
Free-for-all format is not yet recognized by Wizards as a format.
I wouldn't mind Arena having its own version of the Commander format. 4 player games that have the entire card pool of Arenas sets and alchemy.
That would be a great compromise in my opinion. It would at least force newer and more interesting decks occasionally, although I suspect it would be a lot of brawl lists at first lol Would be neat to see how it evolves over time.
Yep. that is what I want.
Most people will refuse to pay some type of subscription or have to buy the cards they already own so they can rebuild and play online. They can stop printing physical sets if they want to but that will make paper magic extremely valuable. Basically everything physical is on a new reserved list type of situation. Honestly i really wouldn't mind that. It would be an improvement to having a secret lair or new set release like every other day. We've got 27,000 cards to choose from and that's plenty.
They don’t even need to do commander on arena. Just make a 4 player mode. The rest of the cards will follow in updates.
exactly
Unless something has changed, I was under the impression that the goal was to get tournament pioneer on arena not full pioneer. Ideally I'd love to get full pioneer but I don't see that happening for awhile.
I fully expect a new Commander Client that will have a different d-base of cards and be separate from Arena. It also means people will need to pay for cards or services (possible sub model) for cards on a different client. WotC has zero fiscal motivation to simply update Arena so we can just use the cards we already have...they won't make any $$$ that way.
Didmt WotC already sau that they wouldnt add commander to Arena bevause the program doesnt work with multiple oppnents?
Good for them if Hasbro can do something like what Jackbox does. Otherwise they're clearly going for quantity over quality. I wonder if MTG players might have some Winged Wisdom to describe how that works out.
When they figure out how to make MTGA support 4 player matches, my group might actually play it more. It's a big change for how they designed it, but I'm still surprised they don't seem to be doing that.
Remember when we used to play CoD or Halo at our friends house? That magic is gone when you play online. The same thing will happen on commander imo.
Modern is 8th edition ("new" card frame) onwards.
One question the team must ask themselves is, how can they make more money by introducing commander on Arena. Hope they can actually figure that out.
Wonder if they'll have to follow through with some of the legislation being passed that forces acknowledgement and list that anything sold digitally is not ownership but a license. But yeah, Commander is a very in person social game, if it moves digitally you remove the social aspect unless you're using alternative means to communicate. Wouldn't throw it past them to decide one day that they'll sell a "booster pack" that literally is just a card with a code to redeem online for a random selection of cards with worse pull rates.
If they start making Magic games like they did back in the early 2010s, I'd be pretty happy.
I know this comment is off topic, but I am looking for your mana ramp deck video. Can you please help me out? Thank you!
They have already screwed up some sets on arena by not adding all the cards and merging some like Amonket remastered and shadows/eldrich remastered. Pioneer is still a ways off. I don’t understand why they don’t take original digital programs like Origins and the Magic 2013, 2014,2015 digital games and port some of the cards from them.
crazy how table top simulator does a better job at playing edh than magic online lol
If Hasbro wants to be a digital games company, they'd need to do the following at minimum:
One, fix the companion app.
Two, they'd need to better streamline the coding of MTGA and fix MTGO's issues such as cards just not working.
Three, whatever game(s) they release need to be worthwhile as they'll be competing for disk space.
Four, realize that they shouldn't compete with themselves for player base unless the games can support split player bases or a core feature that can draw the player base to both games.
monopoly go make more money than probably all of magic combined lol dont worry they'll be fine mobile gaming is like a golden goose nowadays
So you mention 3 issues with Commander on Arena. Multiplayer, how to get cards, and the card pool.
There's definitely a lot of hurdles with getting multiplayer on there but at this point, if they haven't already been ironing out those problems and the coding and developing of this for several years now, whoever is leading the Arena team is an absolute incomplete idiot.
The card acquisition issue is easy to fix. All they need to do is add wildcard packs in the shop, which they should have done right from day 1 for constructed players. They'd have to figure out a price that makes sense within the economy but like $2 for 4 rare wildcards or the equivalent in gems. I'd be far happier spending $100 on 200 rares than wasting my time on the stupid lottery of booster packs. It's not like the option would take anything away from limited players or any money away from WotC.
Then, the card pool issue is the easiest thing ever to solve. There literally isn't a card pool issue. Give players multiplayer and a convenient way to get cards, and they'll make decks and be more than happy to play with the current card pool. It'll give a completely different meta and make things interesting, and players will get to be excited about the card pool expanding every year from both sides with new sets and old sets and remasters being added. Plus, a smaller card pool is probably better for attracting players to the format from Arena because it's cards they've played and are familiar with and often the massive depth of the commander card pool stifles creativity anyways.
You can already buy wildcards on arena and it's $10 for 4 rares and $20 for 4 mythics
@@SuPeRHeRoDuDe3124 Well, just goes to show how little appeal Arena has had to a commander only player. Though that's definitely an insulting price
@@VoidOperator agree
I'm hyped to hear that someone from Blizzard is heading Wotc now. Maybe he'll actually be able to fix Arena and we'll actually be able to play Eternal Formats. I would love more Battle For Baulder's Gate and DnD Sets. I didn't get to buy too much of those 2 products, so another chance to get more Adventures In The Forgotten Reals, would be great. Also I would love to play Commander on Arena. Hopefully they will ditch Alchemy and Finally turn Explorer into full blown Pioneer like they're trying to do. I loved playing Yugioh Master Duel, so they should immulate that digital modle as much as Legally possible. The possibilities here are endless. I just hope that Wotc and Hasbro will be willing to invest the proper resources into making Arena a better MTG experience. I've played a digital version of Cards Against Humanity Online, on my phone, and it was an amazing experience. I would actually like Commander to be separated into teirs. CEDH, Commander, and Pauper Commander as the Teirs. But Pauper Commander is gonna have to be more regulated, and standardized to have only Uncommon Legendaries legal as your Commander, then Wotc could cash in on that by printing more support products for Pauper Commander, and even reprints for CEDH players. The sky is the limit if they do it right.
i Rly hope they make a singel game only with commander. So the special effects and all the veiosions of all cards will be online. So its a combination of arena just foe commander. I would gladly pay 50 dollars for that. and just keep the wild card system there :)
Unless they allow me to build a deck card by card without engaging with the rest of arena, I'm not interested. Also that timer would have to go. Some board states are ridiculous. Speaking of time, extra turn spells would need to be banned on arena.
nobody cares about the card pool for commander in mtg arena, we just need multiplayer
There’s already spell table, discord video, zoom…….
The only reason I'm still playing EDH is the social and support my LGS and to be honest I'm almost changing to boardgames instead, cheaper and easier to deal with....
Commander on arena is sketchy because they probably have to add chat which they have shown they are afraid, maybe even terrified of having on arena
Commander on arena PLEASE!!
I can see Arena going as far back as Modern, but not the older formats. Too big and complicated. Imagine Worldgorger Dragon combo...
Discontinuing paper MTG would likely be Hasbro suicide.
I don't hate the idea of aiming to focus on digital, but only if they actually at least give us 4 player on arena. It would be so much easier for me to get multiple friends in to the game if we can just meet online rather than have to put aside all the time to get together for it. Not that I don't prefer everything in person, but its alot easier to sell people to just downloading something and work on gathering cards digitally, rather than trying to sell them on 40 dollar commander starters. Now do I have faith in them to not screw this up..... no, not in the slightest.
Hasbro all in?? Im all out 😂
As someone who was GRANDMASTER on Overwatch and Overwatch 2, this ceo is this single person that I will attribute to the fall of the game. He came from some soap company into activision where his entire claim to fame was microtransactions that legit killed the franchise. Then he went to blizzard where he basically forced the entire creative directors to quit by installing his friends who are all yes mans in every corner of the company. They had one goal: short term profit through microtransactions. They legit ruined the game. Now they got rid of him because he sucked and he’s at Hasbro in charge of magic?!
THIS IS THE TIME TO BOYCOTT THE GAME. HE WILL RUIN IT. HES IN IT FOR TJE MONEY NOT FOR OUR INTERESTS AS PLAYERS.
let me scan my cards and i'll think about it but i have too much physical media to want to pay for any of it twice
Like... Video games are not a new thing.
Make better board games.
Be sad if Hasbro removed the social aspect from MTG. It's been my number 1 way to meet new people. People need to engage in face to face interactions, digital interactions can be very unhealthy, and so is living your life indoors or in your bedroom.
It would be nice to see MTG back on console
I will never, never play commander on Arena. I would rather quit the game entirely then pay for digital cards.
All they have to do is release annual Switch game that comes with core set then have $30 DLC for each set in the block. THEN every year re-release last year's game and all sets in the block for $90. So you could buy it all as soon as it launches for $130 or wait until it's about to rotate and save $30
Think how the NBA franchise keeps the core game the same. Some art changes. WotC could do the same. And or course sell boosters on the Nintendo Switch eventually 😊
They say that, yet they still haven't put Arena on console
They already turned Magic into a digital game. Twice. (MTGO and Arena.)
Just give me a modern versoin of Shandalar
Oh no, a co.pany with billions in revenue has to hire more people for a different mode? How ever will they do that?
@@MusicalBoarder Well their most popular format by a wide margin isn't on Arena, so aparently its fairly hard.
@@WhatAboutZoidberg they could hire the best programmers they want. They just dont give a fuck and are lazy.
@@WhatAboutZoidberg Financial incentive isn't there even if it were a 4 player client. They would need to digitize so many cards.
I see no incentive to blow money on arena packs when you could just use Tabletop Sim and use cards from all of magic history including unsets. Buying physical at least gives you something. I really don't see a point of playing commander on mobile (or in arena on pc) especially given that they don't even have competitive brawl after all these years.
Hasbro where is our mtg monopoly boards with cast iorn figures 😢
Wait so are they like, going to just stop printing paper Magic??
My biggest criticism of magic arena, is and always will be, sunken cost. I have been collecting magic cards since 2012. Hundreds of dollars, and physical cards gifted are sentimental.
Starting back at zero sucks. The method to get the cards you want is entirely random. Playing the game is way more limited. I can't play the way I want to play in arena nor play the decks I want to play. And then the time and effort I put into paper or digital don't transfer. The time and effort I take to make a really cool deck on arena will have to be repurchased in real life If I want to play a table top version. Why would i do that when I could just play with the cards I have at my LGS?
Bg3 did great so clearly we gotta just be videogames it worked just because its a video-game right?
I'm gonna need an email address to complain at about this move.
Sure, they have to step more into the digital business. But simply porting physical to digital will not be the right way.
Look at Lego which is handling the digital transition way better than Hasbro. But also with Lego, you see that when they try to merge the physical and digital experience, they fail (Hidden Side, VIDIYO,...). But when they simply take their brand and create some parallel product, they succeed. Look at the LEGO movies, the LEGO video games, the LEGO TV shows. All of that works and creates synergies to bring kids to the physical toy and vice versa.
So, instead of bringing Magic formats like Commander to digital, it makes way more sense to focus on parallel products in the Magic universe. A "Diablo" game in the Magic universe, a strategy game like Master of Magic. These games could be linked to Arena so that you for example can use Magic equipment cards to equip your character. Or use your land cards to improve your cities in the strategy games etc. But it's tricky to do this right and balance it properly.
Also, a streaming show or movie in the Magic universe would make an impact (let's see what the Netflix show will bring).
I don't spend money on anything digital anymore.
I love that they keep spitting in the faces of their fans
paper magic won't go anywhere. If they were to decide full digital and stop paper magic, proxies will rise and we will play it anyway (but cheaper) so yeah
And with better card quality.
Better game developing companies have tried this strategy (releasing multiple games per year) with established IP's etc and have failed... this doesn't look good unless they keep the scale and cost of the games low which I DOUBT. Yes there are exceptions but they do not make the rule.
Buy singles or make proxies...
This is the way.
I'm still waiting for a video where you manage to enunciate your intro correctly 😉
Played MTG Arena, Hated it, I won't be wasting money on that game. I will stick to my cardboard. If they stop making that well they just lost me as a customer and I spend lots of money on cardboard. So, Oh well. Guess I will be saving a bit of money.
Love how they like to mention BG3 which they literally didn’t make and had years to develop with the community before the actual release but ok sure hasbro then the creators dipped out as soon as they could. Plus for magic good luck they already soured many for both little and big things more and more of us are more focused on proxy and singles plus Chris needs to stop talking people really wished he stopped talking
How is Chris Cocks still in charge? Lol
What worries me is people that have grown up playing mostly digital games are coming into positions of influence. They don't know what they're missing and physical games are not as appealing to them. Now this doesn't jive with the popularity of Magic - check out any good game store on a Friday night. But the people that get into leadership and influence positions are not necessarily the same caliber of player. If they play at all. And games like the Monopoly GO game are brain dead black holes without depth or real value. UGH. Hopefully there won't be an impact on physical components like Magic or D&D books.
The CEO's name is way too ironic. His swollen pimple head doesn't help either.
Chris COCK"S ???
LOL! Dude , Magic is digital twice already.
D&D is bleeding playera due to their move to digital sales, as well as items being included in their PHB like the trigger forms and player safety from scary ideas. People do NOT like these things, and so many other games are benefitting from this. Not sure HOW this might apply to MTG, but this is very forboding for the game we love.
Didn't learn from the MMO did they.🤣
Done with mtg and their stupid worlds beyond garbage. Marvel is not magic!
Hasbro is losing its identity by going digital, I am not even sure how they are going to compete against established names in digital games and such. Taking the social aspect out of MTG is a bad move
Hilarious. Following the digital assets trends in selling made up product for the same prices as they did when manufacturing still existed. Basically printing money.
Bring mtgo to mobile. Arena is trash.
I’ll never buy digital cards…. They can delete or make a new version of the game and say sorry we can’t transfer your cards over to the new version.
Do you actually believe hasbro cares about anything other than money? An all digital base means no money toward physical product so its free money for share holders. Thats hasbros only goal.
Harry Potter secret lair!
Hmmm
42s ago 😮
Oh hell no
will I play commander on arena, short answer no. long answer also no I have tts and for digital commander i only play it with friends so arena does not at all appeal to me. arena is essentially a gatcha game with the way packs work it would be so insanely expensive to try and build commander decks with the current monetization and I doubt hasbro will want to make it cheaper they want that money.
I was in on the MTGA Beta, and it is trash. A waste of money 100%. Never going back. Physical or nothing. MTGA shuts down and you LOSE EVERYTHING!
imo commander will never be playable on mtga. itll not ever be playable on digital as long as winning is as heavily incentiviced as is the case for any mtga format.
Sounds like a recipe for losing a bunch of thoer customer base and a ton of money.