Booster Box Madness: M12 Edition (Pt1)

Being fairly new to Magic cards (4 months now I guess) I’d never appreciated the distribution of cards in a booster box.  I understood that (excluding foils) you couldn’t get two of the same card in a booster pack.  I understood that each back consisted of 10 common, 3 uncommon & 1 rare card – and that there was a 1 in 8 chance the rare would be replaced with a mythic rare.  Also there is a 1 in 68 chance that one of the common cards is replaced by a foil (and that foil card has an equal chance of being any of the 249 cards in M12 – including lands).  This is where I thought it ended – but it seems it does not.

You see like all trading card games MTG cards are cut from a large sheet.  This enables them to cut the cards in such a way that you don’t get repeats in a pack. I didn’t think about this too much, but it seems that the sheets thing goes further. The number of repeats of a card you will get in a box is also limited (excluding foils).  If you open the packs int he order they were in the box you even get a pattern of the lands that come out so that you get an even number of each type!  Now I’m basing this on the incredibly small sample size of my first M12 box (the second is still sealed ready for a games night in a month or so), but looking back at the New Phyrexia stats I kept (which was one sealed box with an added 8 more boosters from sealed deck events) it holds true.

From the opening of 36 packs from the same M12 box I have:

Common – 352 (not incl. 3 foil cards)

4x           52

3x           46

2x           3

Uncommon – 110 (not incl. 2 foil)

2x           49

1x           10

0x           1              (Cudgel Troll)

Rare – 32 (not incl. 2 foil)

2x           1              (Bird of Paradise)

1x           30

Mythic – 4 (no foil)

1x           4

Foil – 8

3 Common

2 Uncommon

2 Rare                   (Monomania & Redirect)

1 Swamp

As anyone who has even walked past a probability distribution this is unnatural.  It’s like the random sampling has happened to set rules that are hiding in the background – the sheets are probably large and with a non repeated pattern and the start point for a box probably varies dependant on where they come in the run.  This leaves me with the rather odd position of having bought a box of cards and having no real ‘swaps’.  It also means I can guarantee what I’m going to see in box two – 3/4 of every common, 1 or 2 of every common, mostly singletons of rares and some random mythics. 

This means if we play sealed deck with the other box and I have 3 copies of a certain common spell (say ‘cancel’) then I know that the rest of the group only has access to a maximum of one copy of that spell.  At large public tournaments I’m guessing this doesn’t matter at all, but in single store events playing from one box it may distort things a little.

Either way, I’m going to either have to sell the box without having the fun of the sealed/packwars/draft night (unlikely) or end up with a spare of all the commons and a full playset of the uncommons (likely – afterall 4 more mythics may await!).  I don’t mind the predictability of the contents of a booster box – in fact it means I can budget better around and know that any extra packs added on afterwards as impulse buys are far more likely to cause repeat cards.  It does make it far less likely that i’ll buy a 2^nd box in future, but I had my own reasons for not wanting to ‘play as you open’ on the first box this time so in future it’ll be less of an issue.

The mythics I pulled were Gideon, Primevel Titan, Time Reversal & Primordial Hydra.  3 out of 4 are ones I’d play so not bad.

Oops - 3 M12 Booster Boxes and 3 Chandra's Phoenix!

Not all mine. We went to Superdrome Worcester for the prices and snacks.

Ed:

Home now - a spot of relaxed and annotated booster ripping is in order.  One box is getting squirrelled away for multiplayer at a later date.

I do like Superdrome - it's essentially the kind of shop that every high-street should have so I have no qualms about choosing them over the more MTG Pro style store just up the road.  Anywhere that has 4 kinds of Risk and more plastic tat than I did as a teenager must be encouraged and supported.

Will probably post up the results - i'm due a run of underwealming cards, but as I've already found an Adaptive Automaton I'm not going to be too disappointed whatever happens.

Plus I have some amazing stuff from Yum Yum including a tea drink that looks like infected frogspawn and some new Meiji goodies that will get written up at FoodStuff Finds (eventually).

Just two M12 Boosters 0_0

With the Intro packs I got at the Pre-Release detailed below I got two boosters - one in each pack.  Initially I thought I'd let the recipients of the Intro packs open them themselves as it's good fun to do so.  Over the next few days I realised that firstly I wouldn't see the guys until I actually have boxes of boosters to play with, and secondly that getting them 'into' boosters would be a Very Bad Thing which would not enhance their play experience at all.  Me making them decks is far more cost effective and gives me something to do with those commons I have floating around.  They get their moments of discovery from opening & playing the decks so I resolved to open the boosters one a night.

Last night I cracked open the first one.  It was going pretty well - first card Ponder which is the most sought after common card, then a Mage and part of the Empires cycle and then.  A mythic rare dragon! Not only that, but Furyborn Hellkite is playable in the intro deck that I got them (Blood & Fire) and is only 1 mana above the Face card for the pack.  A great pull and as it's the second cheapest M card in the set at the moment not one I'd mind passing on if needed.  Certainly got my value from the £12 Into pack with this lot!

Cut to day two.  It's getting late and I've caught up on all the usual internet stuff so I decide to open the second booster as planned.  Commons are nothing special - even have a duplicate of two or three cards already just from the two boosters I have.  Uncommons are more interesting as there is an O Ring to pop in the Blue deck and a nice fire card and then I get to the card at the back. 

And then I do a double take and have a second look.

Two boosters - two Mythics - and probably the most desirable card in the set at this early stage.  This is Planeswalker number 3 I've found with Vess & Karn also coming in boosters, but probably the most surprising.  The probability of this is only 1 in 64 occasions so if I were to open 2 packs every day I'd get double Mythic once every two months (and I'd probably be poor from buying 128 boosters).

It's amazing luck though and I am certainly keeping both Mythics until after I get the box(es) on Friday so will give them a good amount of replacement loot instead of Chandra, the Firebrand.  Heck - I might even buy more Intro packs and slide the lucky boosters out into my pile just to be on the safe side...

M12 Pre Release Promo Loot

As part of the promo event run by Magic Geek .co.uk I picked up two of the new M12 Intro Decks, Mystical Might and Blood & Fire, along with two Promotional Bloodlord of Vaasgoth.
















First up the Blue White Illusions deck Mystical Might.  This is pretty fast and can cause some trouble for beat down decks as by the time they are playing threats this deck has counter magic up and running.  I managed to hand the first loss to a high ranking agro goblin deck that was playing in the sealed deck, and beat some constructed decks with it too.  It'd be fairly easy to upgrade (there are a lot of non illusion creatures).

The rare card Lord of The Unreal is the star and the deck only lost once when I'd got that out.  Extra copies would make this more consistent.

















The other deck is slightly different - it's a balanced Red Black deck that focuses on the Bloodthirst mechanic so has burn and direct damage as it's theme.  It's also good but seemed less able to beat the decks on offer.  I ran out of time so only played the six necessary games to earn the promo, but never got to play either of the high cost mythics - M12 is just that fast.

The mythic vampire promo would slot right into this deck and boost a good few of the cards.  It'd be harder to supplement the bloodthirst mechanic as M12 is the only standard legal set featuring the keyword.  Haste creatures would be a great way to get first turn damage to start the chain though.




There are some great uncommons in these packs - O ring in Blue White & Swiftfoot Boots in the Red Black so if you aren't looking to get too many boosters it may be a cheaper way to get the star cards of the set in workable decks without breaking the bank.

I didn't open the boosters.

M12 pre release

I completely forgot to live blog the pre release. Things got a bit hectic! I got two intro decks and played around 15 games to earn my promo cards. Pics another day.
Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone

Full Duels of the Planeswalkers Promo Deck Lists - finally!

Turns out that the correct product name for the new Planeswalker promo decks is sample decks and here the listings all are:

MTG D12 M12 Planeswalker Promo Decks



Finally got one of the modern decks (Blue B) to confirm this & to bring the total of Grave Titan Promos to 4.

Full test pic

Planeswalkers big attack

Testing sending pic from phone

Post Planeswalkers, & Pre M12

Well it does seem that I got old decks instead of this years ones - but as the store has run out of cards I can't get my hands on the new ones for a while!

We are kind of in an odd MTG gap now, while people gaze at the new cards and formulate decks that they may never get to play.  I like the Zombie tribe. The Black Deck seems to eat anything that's put in it's way (it's basically designed to mill creatures) and a zombie version could be interesting.  I have three Grave Titans afterall so anything is possible.

I'm thinking that SuperDrome at £83 a booster box (about £2.20 a pack) as a walk up price will be my chosen store again.  60 packs would be ideal so 2 boxes would give me enough to let friends buy and to use as gifts.  Need to pick up some of the starter decks too so hopefully can do that at the pre-release (I'm not playing but it seems rude not to pop in).  Will take a decent camera - the store is like a nerdier version of Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium.

Real life is too busy to worry about finding the cheapest cards & best decks.  I've sorted out my (growing) spares collection and only kept 4 of anything. Digital playtime is where it's at, loosing for fun and winning for unlocks.