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This video literally answered a question I had two hours ago that I couldn’t find an answer to, thanks Prof! It’s _really_ not obvious that the Jumpstart boosters in the beginner box are _not_ Jumpstart 2025, and are instead all standard legal cards. It makes sense that the beginner box wouldn’t have ‘only legal in eternal formats’ cards, but having two different boosters called the same thing, released at the same time, with the same branding, that contain (almost?) entirely different sets of cards is a choice I feel I wouldn’t have made.
i had the same question a while back at target and glad i decided to get the starter collection because it was nice to open 2 packs and have a bunch of cards to play around with even as a new player.
Bro me too 😂 I just got the starter collection because I was struggling with cards. The only set i bought into was bloomburrow and I bought a booster box... not the move. The starter collection was what I needed in my life. It literally fueled the addiction 😂
This entire time I thought the jumpstart "boosters" in the beginner box were the same jumpstart boosters too. Wild that they're not and the messaging has been so confusing on that.
One of my favorite magic experiences was when me and my bro were stuck during the quarantine and just got a box of the first Jumpstart. We spent the day just playing game after game excited as heck for what could be in the next set of packs.
Me and my partner missed prerelease so this is what we did instead! It was great fun and we really liked that there were no 'wrong' colours to go into unlike a prerelease
I'd like to see that episode and the players will consist of 1st time Magic players... like maybe those content creators who focus on Lorcana, Yu-Gi-Oh, Flesh and Blood, etc.
Prof is exactly right. The Beginner Box has been great for introducing my two young kids (9 and 7) to Magic with no experience. We are already looking at expanding the amount of jumpstart half deck options, and this will be a great way to expand into more complex mechanical themes. I will introduce actual decks eventually, but this is a great, self-contained, "board game" sort of experience.
This is where I landed. Whilst I *could* try designing and running an introduction to the game for the kids, the Beginner Box has been easy to give to our 8 year old. She's delighted to have her own game to explore, and we can take it from there.
I bought the starter collection. It was a decent value to me to have a lot of cards for standard. Also it came with a couple nice foil commander cards so that was nice
For beginner box, you have 10 jumpstart decks. You can make - 90 Different 40 Card decks with those - 56 decks with the remaining 8 Jumpstart decks - Total of 5040 different matchups with 40 card decks - 720 decks with 60 cards (3 jumpstart decks) - 210 decks with the remaining 7 jumpstart decks - Total of 151.200 matchups with 60 card decks - You can make 20 different decks of 60 cards using 2 colors - 15 different decks with the remaining cards - total of 300 matchups (60 card dexks with 2 colors)
I really enjoy how you keep multiple perspectives of purchasers in mind for your reviews-it’s very easy for the enfranchised folks to dismiss the “lack of value” contained in these introductory products, but I constantly am looking for more ways to help folks learn to play Magic, and this seems like it’ll be perfect for at least one person who I know that is looking to dive into the game. Thanks for your hard work here!
Hey prof! I won one of the jeweled lotus’ from whatnot and was at work so I didn’t notice till after. I wanted to say thank you so much for the card and all you do for the magic community. I play commander with friends but enjoy almost every one of your videos. As a former TA in gradschool who left academia after getting my doctorate I completely agree with your outlook on academia and it would be so much better if they treated the students and non tenure track professors as humans instead of a cheap workforce to exploit. Thank you for all that you do!
Would LOVE a video about how to turn these products into a draft cube! Maybe even talk about Foundation singles to upgrade the cube further? Love your videos Prof!
I bought 4 starter collections to build some 60 card decks out of as a little battle box to have on hand for board game nights. I think its the single best casual mtg product that has been released since I started playing 8 years ago. Could even sell a couple high-value cards to recoup some of the cost if need be. Great product.
Got both for me and my cousin. I had already dipped my toe back into the mtg pool with Bloomburrow. Figured they would be a good place to start. Although we're both players from back in the day, and are mildly concerned about the world's beyond, we still I think we can have fun with some kitchen table Magic. We may just have to pick and choose our sets, and at least for now foundations seems pretty solid.
Brand new to this game. My 12 year son and I are just starting out and picked up a starter kit with 2 60 card decks as well as this beginner box. it's been really fun learning with him and the your videos have helped a lot in navigating this immense game. Thanks for the videos, keep up the good work.
Hey Prof, I also wanted to add a bit of information that beginner collectors of Foundations may be curious about. If you’re attempting to make a complete set, you will need to purchase both the Beginner box and the Starter collection as well as Play Booster packs. I am a fan of both the art and lore so I collect for enjoyment and not financial reasons. In doing so I have noticed through various box openings that the sets have cards that are exclusive to one another. I thought I would include this for anyone interested. I would also like to say that I am very appreciative of the work you do and the differing opinions that you present. It’s not always easy being the voice of dissent, but it’s a better place when presented with enough information to draw our own conclusions. Thank you for the incredible work you and your team do. I wish you many more years of continued success.
I wonder if the starter collection would make a good point for league. Everyone takes there Not-deck-builders-toolkits-but-we-put-all-the-archetypes-in-them-this-time-instead-of-only-a-handful (but I still loved them) and they build decks from them that evolve as they open packs to add to it. These are both really cool products, I'm glad they exist.
I think one of my favorite things about the starter collection is that it's very versatile. It wasn't just built as an on ramp for standard, but also as an on ramp for cube and commander. If players want to draft, all they need to do is grab is a few more lands and take out a handful of the duplicates to make a quick and easy cube. If players want to get into commander, the starter collection includes 8 two color legendary creatures and enough cards to make any one of them a halfway decent entry into casual commander games with your friends. It really feels like the Deckbuilders Toolkit I wish I had when I first started playing all of those years ago. The card selection was too random and too focused on recent sets to be a good long-term investment for new players. The way this focuses on just the core set experience and the expectation that the cards you get here will be relevant for years to come is a huge plus. This is why i don't really mind that the starter collection isn't quite as focused on a specific format as I'd like. If players want to get into specific formats, I feel there are going to be better, more focused products available for them
This was enormously helpful. WOTC really managed a Wii U situation with the names here. I was debating which one was right for my niece, and it turns out the cheaper kit thing was the right call, and she's learning 60 card standard now because commander is just a bit too much right out the gate for a 13 year old
Thanks, Prof! Answered my question excellently! I wanted to do a soft reboot with my wife and kids, so I bought 4 Starter Collections, one for each of my family members to "start" with, then we'll slowly add booster packs over the next weeks and months (sometimes drafting, sometimes just whole packs) so each person can tailor their collection and decks more organically (yaknow, like we did in the mid-90s) as they learn what they like and don't like.
Slowly getting back into magic after a 5 year long hiatus, unfortunately there are no shops nearby that play the game so Arena it is for me rn, but I've been loving watching Prof again and all the content I missed over the years, it's amazing to see how much the channel as grown!
I'm so very impressed by the beginner box. It is exactly what I wish existed when I started playing magic. One product that my friends and I could buy to try out all the different colors and basic archetypes. No guessing "maybe I'll like this starter or intro deck" based on the art. Add in the replayability and ability to use it to get OTHER new players into magic once you know it's right for you, and it's really perfect.
I bought a starter collection for my nephews birthday. I also got one for myself, just seems like a decent collection of cards. I’m looking forward to building some decks and playing together.
I bought the Beginner Box to take to my friends to introduce them to Magic. It was a blast. I'm probably going to get them some packs and have started designing some Jumpstart decks to play with them. I bought the Starter Collection for myself to help expand my collection. Since I mostly play Commander, I'm not worried about have a 4-set, but it fills in some holes in having cards to just build things with.
We needed these kinds of products Decades ago. Yes, financial value is low, but besides the intro decks which were of dubious quality, and fat packs/ bundles, there wasn't really a good launchpad for brand new players. You don't want too complex of mechanics, yet at the same time, be so underpowered that every game becomes a slog. So yeah, not the best for expert players, but incredible stuff for the newbies.
I bought the Beginner box last night, sleeved up all the jumpstart "packs," and numbered the sleeve fronts so they could be separated into packs again. I even put together ninja and descend packs from my collection, so now I can have up to 6 players from the one box. It's a jump-start cube built like a family game night board game. I'm leaving a 12-sided die in the box and each player can roll for which two packs they get. I may create more packs to get it to 10 players.
I'm buying both for a friend that I'm acting as a sherpa for. The simplicity of the beginner box will make entry much easier, and the wide range of cards in the starter collection will give him plenty to build with as he comes into his own
My playgroup bought starter collections on release and a few packs, now we're doing a weekly league where we get a few new packs to add to the pool, it's going really well so far!
I'n my humble opinion, the Starter Collection feels like Deckbuilder's Toolkit (and I'm all here for that!) You got a brick of cards ✅️ a brick of lands ✅️ a deckbuilding manual ✅️ and boosters ✅️ And now the fun little clicky wheel :D
I've been playing for just over a year and a half, and the starter collection was EXACTLY the product for me. I have collected a lot of cards, but the consistency and up-to-date meta of these foundations cards blew me away. Also, I still was having problems with having enough lands playing Winston Draft with my friend (who started when I did). This was an amazing product for me, but Prof is so right on the actual $ value of it.
My gf and I are brand new to magic and on advice of the game shop we got the beginner box. It was perfect and we are already building decks with cards from other booster sets
It's totally unrelated to the vid, but I would have loved to have you as a college professor, Prof! Your videos are very easy to follow! Love the content!!! 😊
i have a fairly large collection of magic cards(5190 as of typing), but none of them are really... standardized sets where i could pull from it and put those cards in another deck. some are close like my strixhaven and bloom burrow, but otherwise i have no real way to combine the sets mechnics into something that i could call my own. i have been thinking that the starter collection would be perfect for helping bridge the gaps for what i want.
This video made me feel nostalgic idk. Foundations made me remember my first deck which was just a blue/black deck. No theme just removing my opponents threats and playing big blue evasive creatures. It made me love magic. I know prof would advise against but I did buy the Monsterous Suprise Dark Ascension Intro deck which I won my first FNM with after some upgrades. It's when I first started watching you on my first TH-cam channel before I lost access to it.
Can 100% say that the 3 Commander Cards were a nice touch for the SC. Personally, i don't have the largest collection to pull from. I primarily play Commander, and my method for building decks thus far has been simply buying and altering Precons. It just seems to be the most cost efficient way to get all of the must have cards quickly. So most of the spare cards are the crap im taking out of those decks or are bulk from packs. Not saying every card in the SC is a banger, but there are enough that are as well as a diverse selection to where i could get a deck off the ground and trade up for some more optimized cards. Love the product from concept to finish and happy WOTC is at least considering some other demographics in their fanbase.
I got both to get back into magic with some friends. We're kinda using it like a cube. Both are pretty good if you're looking to build a few decks using this new power level. But hell it was expensive, considering I had to get sleeves and deckboxes... And its fine that I got the Beginner Box, because it too has some staples. I can make a mean elves deck now >:)
Thank you for the video. I wanted to get into Magic with Foundations, went to my local gamestore, looked at these two items, couldn't really tell what was a better value, and then just gave up because of that. Obviously a somewhat irrational thing to do, and I could've just asked the workers there if I waited for them to be free, but regardless. I'm sure I'm not the only one it happened to.
I know talking value is not an intention of these products, but it is important to note that the Starter Collection does include the Foundations boosters. Not only are you getting a collection of ~400 cards, but you also do have a small chance at pulling a valuable and fun card (Doubling Season, Omniscience, BlasEdict, etc.) as well.
As someone who sold my collection a decade ago (opening boxes of Dragon's Maze will do that) with an SO I want to get to play with little experience, it looks like I'm in a good situation for the Beginner Box to get them comfortable with playing Magic. Maybe once we find a play group in the area the Starter Collection or Commander pre-cons will be a better value, but for now it looks like I'm pretty close to the target audience.
My 2 cents, I really like the starter collection in concept, and the product given as well. It'd be nice if future sets also came with a starter collection, making a means to jumpstart (no pun intended) new players collections. the mostly static nature of it is nice in a similar way to commander decks, as it lets people know what they're getting into, with the included packs being a nice bit of randomness to spice up the product. Honestly, even as someone who's been playing for 20 years now, I'm probably going to grab one or two of the starter collection myself, as the singular rares and mythics will be nice additions to my commander decks (Of which I have THREE Stanley's full of decks, thanks Prof for that old review) and the more bulk stuff I can pass a few newer friends to the game to give them options for tweaking their decks some. I sincerely hope WotC makes the decision todo more of these starter collections. imagine a modern or commander oriented version meant to get players some useful cards for those formats. Hell even just ones for the future standard sets would be nice.
I bought the beginner box hoping to teach my non-gamer friends how to play. But I recently played it with an experienced MTG player who stopped playing many years ago, and he had a great time playing those reprints he had seen before. The few games we played were short but packed with actions compared to the slow burn in Commanders. I lost so badly to him but glad I could put the game and shame away quickly after less than an hour...
Both products strike me as really excellent designs for different entry points to the game, i used to love the old deckbuilders toolkits, so the starter collection is a welcome return, although i really miss the old 20 dollar price tag.
the starter collection is pretty much a better version of the old Deckbuilder's Toolkit, and I think those were great! one of those kits is how I got my start in Magic, and this seems like a way better way to go with a way better card pool. the three packs are also a great way to get some uniqueness into the box, and possibly open some sick rares! personally, as an enfranchised player, the Begginer Box solved a problem I had, which is that while I have a decent collection for myself, I never had a good way of introducing people to Magic. I don't like starting with Commander, and I don't have simple decks to use for intro games. I bought the LOTR duel deck a while back, but I find it not only boring for me to use the same decks, but also the decks overall not particularly interesting. with the jumpstart decks, there's a lot of variety I can introduce. plus, the playmets (albeit cardboard) and the play guide are great tools to help me explain the game to people, which is just a thing I personally tend to struggle with
Or, you could buy multiples of each product to get more copies of potential staples for your beginner playgroup and you can combine the 2 products together to build decks for kitchen table MTG or a casual beginner Commander Format playgroup. This way you and your friends whom are new to the game can gain more experience before jumping into FNM. Or if you don't have an LGS in your area, you can have FNM at Home with just your friends.
(For context I have 350 hours in MTG Arena) I bought the starter collection to build decks to play against each other as I have never played it in person so thought I best take it slow but wanted the chance to customize a bit. No doubt I will be buying an entire booster box/buying singles in no time.
... that said, I think the JS cards should each have come with their own sub-numbering so you could reconstruct the decks. Giving them all the same land (ideally full art) would have helped, too. Honestly I think JS rules should require you to choose 2 different colored decks, both for limited purposes (the mono color JS deck has substantive advantages over the two color one in terms of mulliganing for example; you can just shuffle until you get your bomb and then be happy) and for deck-deconstruction purposes afterwards.
I feel like the starter collection is 90% on the way to being a cube product. I know limited is not the most casual-friendly, but I think cube could be a great on-ramp to draft
I really like the execution of the Beginner Box; 10 monocolor (2x each color) Jumpstart decks sounds like a great "battle box" and a fun way to get people into magic. $30 it a bit higher than I'd want to pay to give these away like candy, but it's far better than MOKM/Clue's $80 for... 8 JS decks? I like that all the JS cards are standard legal (seriously, Foundations JS itself should have just done this too). I can't help but think that had this been $20 or $25, I could justify buying one of these for everyone I know at Christmas... and that would bring a lot of new players into magic; but $30 is still great. THAT SAID, I haven't ended up buying one yet... take that for what it is.
I was thinking about how I always see prof posting about the crazy backlash he receives on every video. I’ll counter act that. I fucking love profs videos I love his opinions, his honesty thoughts. Always 100% for the benefit of us the players. I don’t know if there’s anything I’ve ever disagreed on with genuine opinions prof has voiced. Hearing him say “this product isn’t about monetary value” just added to that fact.
honestly would've been nice to have a product for commander deck brewing. the arcane, sol ring, and command tower are nice to have. I ended up buying the starter standard set to help with commander deck brewing but it's got holes in it for sure.
The Beginner Box is a nice thing to have on hand to teach people the game, but for actual collectors and players, the Starter Collection is the obviously superior product, even at double the price.
9:59 I'll add one asterisk to this: I think the beginner box might be worth owning as an established player purely for teaching others. The hardest part about learning magic is that you're trying to learn how the game works while also trying to learn what the cards in front of you do. It's a lot of information to process at once. The unshuffled tutorial decks + booklet seem like they really help to solve this problem. The new player gets a turn-by-turn breakdown of the game, complete with explanations of the cards they are looking at. Being able to pull an incredible teaching tool like that off the shelf whenever I want to introduce a friend to the game genuinely might be worth the sticker price to me.
Sarter colelction was 1st product from MTG I bought I got 2 good hits: Borderless Sire of the seven, doubling season. Sold both and I'm on profit already
Great video! I’ve loved the movie in its various forms over the years. I’ve recently been reading Dickens and would love to finally read this- is there a version that you recommend?
Im definitely going to get a bundle, but the starter collection might be the only one of two I wanted. I'm not a new player though, and I dont need it, so since I saw it at 50 at one point, I'll wait and see if the price drops.
You should make a video creating Commander PreCon decks from the Starter Collection, akin to the video making such off of the Marvel Secret Lair commanders.
40 mono blue cards, 38 mono red cards, and 39 of each of the other colors? What a great way to teach players which colors most often get shafted and which get all the push 😂
Prof or his staff missed something here: the starter collection has 387 cards, BUT 90 of those cards are basic lands, and another 48 are non-basic lands. This means there are only 249 non-land cards, yet Prof said over 300 non-land cards.
Lol I took Profs advice and bought singles of a Mono White Cat deck that I got from anothr streamer...It only cost me $30 and can foil it out for another 20 if i wanted...I probably would have bought one or both these products as most of the cards are in both products...Ill still probably buy for my first sol ring anyway lol
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Let's Play The Booster Box Game For Magic: The Gathering Foundations: th-cam.com/video/9izGtYdcHjI/w-d-xo.html
Buy a "The Professor" t-shirt, Tolarian Sportsball tee, or TCC Hoodie for a limited time at store.dftba.com/collections/tolarian-community-college !
This video literally answered a question I had two hours ago that I couldn’t find an answer to, thanks Prof! It’s _really_ not obvious that the Jumpstart boosters in the beginner box are _not_ Jumpstart 2025, and are instead all standard legal cards. It makes sense that the beginner box wouldn’t have ‘only legal in eternal formats’ cards, but having two different boosters called the same thing, released at the same time, with the same branding, that contain (almost?) entirely different sets of cards is a choice I feel I wouldn’t have made.
Just realised I said boosters when they’re not actually listed as ‘boosters’ but hopefully you all got what I was saying anyway 😅
i had the same question a while back at target and glad i decided to get the starter collection because it was nice to open 2 packs and have a bunch of cards to play around with even as a new player.
Well, many Magic the Gathering players ask this lol
Bro me too 😂 I just got the starter collection because I was struggling with cards. The only set i bought into was bloomburrow and I bought a booster box... not the move. The starter collection was what I needed in my life. It literally fueled the addiction 😂
This entire time I thought the jumpstart "boosters" in the beginner box were the same jumpstart boosters too. Wild that they're not and the messaging has been so confusing on that.
Shuffle up and play idea! Everyone gets a starter collection box and builds a deck out of it! Really interested to see others do this!
This is unironically what i did for my first custom commander deck.
I think it went well, I like it.
One of my favorite magic experiences was when me and my bro were stuck during the quarantine and just got a box of the first Jumpstart. We spent the day just playing game after game excited as heck for what could be in the next set of packs.
Me and my partner missed prerelease so this is what we did instead! It was great fun and we really liked that there were no 'wrong' colours to go into unlike a prerelease
Amazing idea hopes it happens.
I'd like to see that episode and the players will consist of 1st time Magic players... like maybe those content creators who focus on Lorcana, Yu-Gi-Oh, Flesh and Blood, etc.
Prof is exactly right. The Beginner Box has been great for introducing my two young kids (9 and 7) to Magic with no experience. We are already looking at expanding the amount of jumpstart half deck options, and this will be a great way to expand into more complex mechanical themes. I will introduce actual decks eventually, but this is a great, self-contained, "board game" sort of experience.
This is where I landed. Whilst I *could* try designing and running an introduction to the game for the kids, the Beginner Box has been easy to give to our 8 year old. She's delighted to have her own game to explore, and we can take it from there.
So the starter collection is a starter to your collection, while the beginner box is a box for beginners.
I bought the starter collection. It was a decent value to me to have a lot of cards for standard. Also it came with a couple nice foil commander cards so that was nice
For beginner box, you have 10 jumpstart decks. You can make
- 90 Different 40 Card decks with those
- 56 decks with the remaining 8 Jumpstart decks
- Total of 5040 different matchups with 40 card decks
- 720 decks with 60 cards (3 jumpstart decks)
- 210 decks with the remaining 7 jumpstart decks
- Total of 151.200 matchups with 60 card decks
- You can make 20 different decks of 60 cards using 2 colors
- 15 different decks with the remaining cards
- total of 300 matchups (60 card dexks with 2 colors)
This guy maths
Sounds like a great battle box to have like a board game to me
as a new player i really wanted to know thank you so much !
Welcome!
Thank you Prof for everything! I started MTG in February and i love your channel!
I really enjoy how you keep multiple perspectives of purchasers in mind for your reviews-it’s very easy for the enfranchised folks to dismiss the “lack of value” contained in these introductory products, but I constantly am looking for more ways to help folks learn to play Magic, and this seems like it’ll be perfect for at least one person who I know that is looking to dive into the game. Thanks for your hard work here!
Hey prof! I won one of the jeweled lotus’ from whatnot and was at work so I didn’t notice till after. I wanted to say thank you so much for the card and all you do for the magic community. I play commander with friends but enjoy almost every one of your videos. As a former TA in gradschool who left academia after getting my doctorate I completely agree with your outlook on academia and it would be so much better if they treated the students and non tenure track professors as humans instead of a cheap workforce to exploit. Thank you for all that you do!
Gonna be honest, I find it super weird that characters like Giada and Liliana are on the cover when they're not in the product.
Would LOVE a video about how to turn these products into a draft cube! Maybe even talk about Foundation singles to upgrade the cube further? Love your videos Prof!
I bought 4 starter collections to build some 60 card decks out of as a little battle box to have on hand for board game nights. I think its the single best casual mtg product that has been released since I started playing 8 years ago. Could even sell a couple high-value cards to recoup some of the cost if need be. Great product.
Got both for me and my cousin. I had already dipped my toe back into the mtg pool with Bloomburrow. Figured they would be a good place to start.
Although we're both players from back in the day, and are mildly concerned about the world's beyond, we still I think we can have fun with some kitchen table Magic. We may just have to pick and choose our sets, and at least for now foundations seems pretty solid.
Brand new to this game. My 12 year son and I are just starting out and picked up a starter kit with 2 60 card decks as well as this beginner box. it's been really fun learning with him and the your videos have helped a lot in navigating this immense game. Thanks for the videos, keep up the good work.
Vengeful Bloodwitch is a playset, 1 copy is borderless full art.
Hey Prof, I also wanted to add a bit of information that beginner collectors of Foundations may be curious about. If you’re attempting to make a complete set, you will need to purchase both the Beginner box and the Starter collection as well as Play Booster packs. I am a fan of both the art and lore so I collect for enjoyment and not financial reasons. In doing so I have noticed through various box openings that the sets have cards that are exclusive to one another. I thought I would include this for anyone interested. I would also like to say that I am very appreciative of the work you do and the differing opinions that you present. It’s not always easy being the voice of dissent, but it’s a better place when presented with enough information to draw our own conclusions. Thank you for the incredible work you and your team do. I wish you many more years of continued success.
I wonder if the starter collection would make a good point for league. Everyone takes there Not-deck-builders-toolkits-but-we-put-all-the-archetypes-in-them-this-time-instead-of-only-a-handful (but I still loved them) and they build decks from them that evolve as they open packs to add to it.
These are both really cool products, I'm glad they exist.
I ended up buying both in hopes of getting my family into MTG.
I think one of my favorite things about the starter collection is that it's very versatile. It wasn't just built as an on ramp for standard, but also as an on ramp for cube and commander.
If players want to draft, all they need to do is grab is a few more lands and take out a handful of the duplicates to make a quick and easy cube. If players want to get into commander, the starter collection includes 8 two color legendary creatures and enough cards to make any one of them a halfway decent entry into casual commander games with your friends.
It really feels like the Deckbuilders Toolkit I wish I had when I first started playing all of those years ago. The card selection was too random and too focused on recent sets to be a good long-term investment for new players. The way this focuses on just the core set experience and the expectation that the cards you get here will be relevant for years to come is a huge plus.
This is why i don't really mind that the starter collection isn't quite as focused on a specific format as I'd like. If players want to get into specific formats, I feel there are going to be better, more focused products available for them
I picked up both for myself to just build up a collection. Plus i kinda love the player board mats that came with the beginner box.
This was enormously helpful. WOTC really managed a Wii U situation with the names here.
I was debating which one was right for my niece, and it turns out the cheaper kit thing was the right call, and she's learning 60 card standard now because commander is just a bit too much right out the gate for a 13 year old
such a straight forward explanation for a product that has caused so much confusion
Thanks, Prof! Answered my question excellently! I wanted to do a soft reboot with my wife and kids, so I bought 4 Starter Collections, one for each of my family members to "start" with, then we'll slowly add booster packs over the next weeks and months (sometimes drafting, sometimes just whole packs) so each person can tailor their collection and decks more organically (yaknow, like we did in the mid-90s) as they learn what they like and don't like.
Slowly getting back into magic after a 5 year long hiatus, unfortunately there are no shops nearby that play the game so Arena it is for me rn, but I've been loving watching Prof again and all the content I missed over the years, it's amazing to see how much the channel as grown!
I'm so very impressed by the beginner box. It is exactly what I wish existed when I started playing magic. One product that my friends and I could buy to try out all the different colors and basic archetypes. No guessing "maybe I'll like this starter or intro deck" based on the art. Add in the replayability and ability to use it to get OTHER new players into magic once you know it's right for you, and it's really perfect.
I am a new player and ended up buying both last night. I regret nothing.
I bought a starter collection for my nephews birthday. I also got one for myself, just seems like a decent collection of cards. I’m looking forward to building some decks and playing together.
I bought the Beginner Box to take to my friends to introduce them to Magic. It was a blast. I'm probably going to get them some packs and have started designing some Jumpstart decks to play with them. I bought the Starter Collection for myself to help expand my collection. Since I mostly play Commander, I'm not worried about have a 4-set, but it fills in some holes in having cards to just build things with.
I started building only foundations commander decks and they have been pretty fun! It's a fun limitation that i hope others will try 😅🤠
We needed these kinds of products Decades ago. Yes, financial value is low, but besides the intro decks which were of dubious quality, and fat packs/ bundles, there wasn't really a good launchpad for brand new players.
You don't want too complex of mechanics, yet at the same time, be so underpowered that every game becomes a slog.
So yeah, not the best for expert players, but incredible stuff for the newbies.
I bought the Beginner box last night, sleeved up all the jumpstart "packs," and numbered the sleeve fronts so they could be separated into packs again. I even put together ninja and descend packs from my collection, so now I can have up to 6 players from the one box. It's a jump-start cube built like a family game night board game. I'm leaving a 12-sided die in the box and each player can roll for which two packs they get. I may create more packs to get it to 10 players.
I'm buying both for a friend that I'm acting as a sherpa for. The simplicity of the beginner box will make entry much easier, and the wide range of cards in the starter collection will give him plenty to build with as he comes into his own
My playgroup bought starter collections on release and a few packs, now we're doing a weekly league where we get a few new packs to add to the pool, it's going really well so far!
I'n my humble opinion, the Starter Collection feels like Deckbuilder's Toolkit (and I'm all here for that!)
You got
a brick of cards ✅️
a brick of lands ✅️
a deckbuilding manual ✅️
and boosters ✅️
And now the fun little clicky wheel :D
I've been playing for just over a year and a half, and the starter collection was EXACTLY the product for me. I have collected a lot of cards, but the consistency and up-to-date meta of these foundations cards blew me away. Also, I still was having problems with having enough lands playing Winston Draft with my friend (who started when I did). This was an amazing product for me, but Prof is so right on the actual $ value of it.
I love that im not going to buy either but still watch these videos
My gf and I are brand new to magic and on advice of the game shop we got the beginner box. It was perfect and we are already building decks with cards from other booster sets
I've been waiting for this video. It really clarified what each product is and what they are for. Thanks Professor.
I bought both because I wanted to get family involved with the hobby and then help upgrade their decks so they felt more personal to them !
I'm so glad I preordered a starter collection before release. They have sold out entirely in my area and no-one is sure if WOTC is reprinting.
Starter Collection is reminiscent of the old deck builder toolkits. That's how my son and I got enough cards for our first few decks back in 2013.
I wish these were around when I was actively seeking out and teaching people how to play the game.
It's totally unrelated to the vid, but I would have loved to have you as a college professor, Prof! Your videos are very easy to follow! Love the content!!! 😊
A much anticipated one! Thanks!
I WANTED THIS VIDEO. I got the starter colection 1 day early. And i loved it!
i have a fairly large collection of magic cards(5190 as of typing), but none of them are really... standardized sets where i could pull from it and put those cards in another deck. some are close like my strixhaven and bloom burrow, but otherwise i have no real way to combine the sets mechnics into something that i could call my own. i have been thinking that the starter collection would be perfect for helping bridge the gaps for what i want.
Thanks Professor
This video made me feel nostalgic idk. Foundations made me remember my first deck which was just a blue/black deck. No theme just removing my opponents threats and playing big blue evasive creatures. It made me love magic. I know prof would advise against but I did buy the Monsterous Suprise Dark Ascension Intro deck which I won my first FNM with after some upgrades. It's when I first started watching you on my first TH-cam channel before I lost access to it.
Can 100% say that the 3 Commander Cards were a nice touch for the SC. Personally, i don't have the largest collection to pull from. I primarily play Commander, and my method for building decks thus far has been simply buying and altering Precons. It just seems to be the most cost efficient way to get all of the must have cards quickly. So most of the spare cards are the crap im taking out of those decks or are bulk from packs.
Not saying every card in the SC is a banger, but there are enough that are as well as a diverse selection to where i could get a deck off the ground and trade up for some more optimized cards. Love the product from concept to finish and happy WOTC is at least considering some other demographics in their fanbase.
I got both to get back into magic with some friends. We're kinda using it like a cube. Both are pretty good if you're looking to build a few decks using this new power level. But hell it was expensive, considering I had to get sleeves and deckboxes... And its fine that I got the Beginner Box, because it too has some staples. I can make a mean elves deck now >:)
“Shuffle up and play”
He did it it, he said the name of the show
Roll credits
I got the Beginner Box for my soon to be 9 year old's birthday. He's been trying to learn with my Commander decks.
Thank you for the video. I wanted to get into Magic with Foundations, went to my local gamestore, looked at these two items, couldn't really tell what was a better value, and then just gave up because of that. Obviously a somewhat irrational thing to do, and I could've just asked the workers there if I waited for them to be free, but regardless. I'm sure I'm not the only one it happened to.
I feel the Starter Collection is very reminiscent of the old “deck builders toolkits” which Is how I started my collection back in 2012
I know talking value is not an intention of these products, but it is important to note that the Starter Collection does include the Foundations boosters. Not only are you getting a collection of ~400 cards, but you also do have a small chance at pulling a valuable and fun card (Doubling Season, Omniscience, BlasEdict, etc.) as well.
I'm going to use the beginner box to get my workplace addicted to magic.
It looks surprisingly well thought out compared to modern expectations.
As someone who sold my collection a decade ago (opening boxes of Dragon's Maze will do that) with an SO I want to get to play with little experience, it looks like I'm in a good situation for the Beginner Box to get them comfortable with playing Magic. Maybe once we find a play group in the area the Starter Collection or Commander pre-cons will be a better value, but for now it looks like I'm pretty close to the target audience.
My 2 cents, I really like the starter collection in concept, and the product given as well. It'd be nice if future sets also came with a starter collection, making a means to jumpstart (no pun intended) new players collections. the mostly static nature of it is nice in a similar way to commander decks, as it lets people know what they're getting into, with the included packs being a nice bit of randomness to spice up the product. Honestly, even as someone who's been playing for 20 years now, I'm probably going to grab one or two of the starter collection myself, as the singular rares and mythics will be nice additions to my commander decks (Of which I have THREE Stanley's full of decks, thanks Prof for that old review) and the more bulk stuff I can pass a few newer friends to the game to give them options for tweaking their decks some.
I sincerely hope WotC makes the decision todo more of these starter collections. imagine a modern or commander oriented version meant to get players some useful cards for those formats. Hell even just ones for the future standard sets would be nice.
Been waiting for this vid since the set dropped, thank you.
I bought the beginner box hoping to teach my non-gamer friends how to play. But I recently played it with an experienced MTG player who stopped playing many years ago, and he had a great time playing those reprints he had seen before. The few games we played were short but packed with actions compared to the slow burn in Commanders. I lost so badly to him but glad I could put the game and shame away quickly after less than an hour...
Both products strike me as really excellent designs for different entry points to the game, i used to love the old deckbuilders toolkits, so the starter collection is a welcome return, although i really miss the old 20 dollar price tag.
I'm a fairly experienced magic player and I'm getting the starter collection as an easy way to make a Foundations twobert cube!
The starter collection sounds like a “Starter Cube” a great way to play magic even for experience players 😉
Thanks for the video prof and team. Was waiting for this one!
Not sure why i just noticed this but saw you hit 1 mil subs! Congratulations!!!
the starter collection is pretty much a better version of the old Deckbuilder's Toolkit, and I think those were great! one of those kits is how I got my start in Magic, and this seems like a way better way to go with a way better card pool. the three packs are also a great way to get some uniqueness into the box, and possibly open some sick rares!
personally, as an enfranchised player, the Begginer Box solved a problem I had, which is that while I have a decent collection for myself, I never had a good way of introducing people to Magic. I don't like starting with Commander, and I don't have simple decks to use for intro games. I bought the LOTR duel deck a while back, but I find it not only boring for me to use the same decks, but also the decks overall not particularly interesting. with the jumpstart decks, there's a lot of variety I can introduce. plus, the playmets (albeit cardboard) and the play guide are great tools to help me explain the game to people, which is just a thing I personally tend to struggle with
very good watch, as a person slowly getting back in after...er 20 years, it just confirmed my initial feelings
Or, you could buy multiples of each product to get more copies of potential staples for your beginner playgroup and you can combine the 2 products together to build decks for kitchen table MTG or a casual beginner Commander Format playgroup. This way you and your friends whom are new to the game can gain more experience before jumping into FNM. Or if you don't have an LGS in your area, you can have FNM at Home with just your friends.
(For context I have 350 hours in MTG Arena) I bought the starter collection to build decks to play against each other as I have never played it in person so thought I best take it slow but wanted the chance to customize a bit. No doubt I will be buying an entire booster box/buying singles in no time.
... that said, I think the JS cards should each have come with their own sub-numbering so you could reconstruct the decks. Giving them all the same land (ideally full art) would have helped, too. Honestly I think JS rules should require you to choose 2 different colored decks, both for limited purposes (the mono color JS deck has substantive advantages over the two color one in terms of mulliganing for example; you can just shuffle until you get your bomb and then be happy) and for deck-deconstruction purposes afterwards.
The Starter Collection actually does have a full playset of Vengeful Bloodwitch, but one of the copies is a full alt-art.
My younger cousin is getting back into the game and I think the Starter Collection will be great for him!
I feel like the starter collection is 90% on the way to being a cube product. I know limited is not the most casual-friendly, but I think cube could be a great on-ramp to draft
I really like the execution of the Beginner Box; 10 monocolor (2x each color) Jumpstart decks sounds like a great "battle box" and a fun way to get people into magic. $30 it a bit higher than I'd want to pay to give these away like candy, but it's far better than MOKM/Clue's $80 for... 8 JS decks? I like that all the JS cards are standard legal (seriously, Foundations JS itself should have just done this too). I can't help but think that had this been $20 or $25, I could justify buying one of these for everyone I know at Christmas... and that would bring a lot of new players into magic; but $30 is still great. THAT SAID, I haven't ended up buying one yet... take that for what it is.
I was thinking about how I always see prof posting about the crazy backlash he receives on every video. I’ll counter act that. I fucking love profs videos I love his opinions, his honesty thoughts. Always 100% for the benefit of us the players. I don’t know if there’s anything I’ve ever disagreed on with genuine opinions prof has voiced. Hearing him say “this product isn’t about monetary value” just added to that fact.
“We love the Professor” they all said in unison
i loved deck builders toolkits when i first started playing seems similar to those
honestly would've been nice to have a product for commander deck brewing. the arcane, sol ring, and command tower are nice to have. I ended up buying the starter standard set to help with commander deck brewing but it's got holes in it for sure.
The Beginner Box is a nice thing to have on hand to teach people the game, but for actual collectors and players, the Starter Collection is the obviously superior product, even at double the price.
9:59 I'll add one asterisk to this: I think the beginner box might be worth owning as an established player purely for teaching others.
The hardest part about learning magic is that you're trying to learn how the game works while also trying to learn what the cards in front of you do. It's a lot of information to process at once.
The unshuffled tutorial decks + booklet seem like they really help to solve this problem. The new player gets a turn-by-turn breakdown of the game, complete with explanations of the cards they are looking at.
Being able to pull an incredible teaching tool like that off the shelf whenever I want to introduce a friend to the game genuinely might be worth the sticker price to me.
thx for the video as always!
Sarter colelction was 1st product from MTG I bought I got 2 good hits: Borderless Sire of the seven, doubling season. Sold both and I'm on profit already
It's wild that the products this 20 year veteran of the game have been most excited for are intended for new players.
The Starter Collection almost seems like you could shuffle up the non-lands, put them in some Cubamajigs, and have a low-power cube draft immediately.
Great video! I’ve loved the movie in its various forms over the years. I’ve recently been reading Dickens and would love to finally read this- is there a version that you recommend?
Great video. Thank you.
Im definitely going to get a bundle, but the starter collection might be the only one of two I wanted. I'm not a new player though, and I dont need it, so since I saw it at 50 at one point, I'll wait and see if the price drops.
You should make a video creating Commander PreCon decks from the Starter Collection, akin to the video making such off of the Marvel Secret Lair commanders.
I love Angelic Destiny too!
I'm clmbinin them two to build a begginers cube to see if i'll enjoy the experience.
These remind me of those old fat pack boxes! And those were great!
Man, the Starter Collection has some Cube potential but for newbies!
Modern Horizons 3 is another example of a commander product masked as a modern (or 1v1 format) product.
Very well said.
40 mono blue cards, 38 mono red cards, and 39 of each of the other colors? What a great way to teach players which colors most often get shafted and which get all the push 😂
Prof or his staff missed something here: the starter collection has 387 cards, BUT 90 of those cards are basic lands, and another 48 are non-basic lands. This means there are only 249 non-land cards, yet Prof said over 300 non-land cards.
The starters collection would’ve benefited from having more of the temple lands they aren’t great but would be nice as a starter set of mana fixing
Lol I took Profs advice and bought singles of a Mono White Cat deck that I got from anothr streamer...It only cost me $30 and can foil it out for another 20 if i wanted...I probably would have bought one or both these products as most of the cards are in both products...Ill still probably buy for my first sol ring anyway lol