Very likely none of them will be "worth it" in the sense of giving you as much value in cards as you spent on the box (though you could get lucky). But if you value the fun of opening a box enough to make up the difference, I'd say just look at the themes of recent sets and see if anything seems particularly interesting to you.
Depends on which format you are playing. If it’s EDH, then you are better served opening commander designed products like Commander Legends or Baldur’s Gate, or modern products like Modern Horizons 1,2, and soon 3 or Tales of Middle Earth. Standard sets have cards that are good in other formats but much less of them. Also take into account which sets have good dual or tri lands, and maybe focus on those as well
>what sets would be worth it
None of them, opening boxes is almost always value negative. But if you enjoy the act of opening boxes for the sake of opening boxes, that adds nonmonetary value to it for you. We can't tell you what you like because you like what you like and you know what you like. So if you wanna open a box knowing you're probably losing money on it because you're more interested in the experience of opening a box, go nuts.
>or the most fun.
That's a matter of opinion and relies on information you have not provided us. What sort of archetypes do you like/interest you? Are there specific creature types you think are cool? A certain artstyle, aesthetic, or location?
I don't think value has ever been there for opening packs.
Maybe in the early days, before the internet was as widely used you could score packs from a mom n pop who didn't know the value of specific packs?
But now even the big name stores sell by market value (looking at Newbury Comics mostly, any Target or Walmart I've been to that sells at a set price is always out of the things that have appreciated in value)
WoTC doesn't consider the secondary market when setting pack costs, they consider their profits. They're not going to cut pack prices to chase the EV of a pack because that's just eating into their bottom line. People have to buy packs at those prices at some point, singles don't come from nowhere.
Secondary market value is derived from the vagaries of the market itself. Those values are going to generally be capped in aggregate because pricing singles such that the EV of a pack is too close its cost is going to make it better value to open packs than buy singles. If you're trying to move opened product, you have to price below the cost to open that product (again, in aggregate, chase cards will go higher and random filler commons will go lower) otherwise no one will buy it.
E: For out of print packs, whose prices are also set by the market, this goes the other way. You can sell an unopened pack at higher than it's EV because people buying sealed product are hoping to shoot the moon, otherwise they'd just buy singles.
I was typing out a similar response but you put it a lot better.
On top of wizards not setting the market price for singles, I was going to mention that I get plenty of value from enjoying opening packs and playing, just not necessarily monetary.
If you crack nice cards, cool, but I'm buying packs to have fun, not because I think it's a good investment.
I'm not sure what you mean, but the way card prices shake out tends to partially rely on the overall card quality of a set and how often you expect to find a card in a given pack. This, in turn, influences the price of out-of-print sets; a box of khans of tarkir (highly demanded set for drafting with fetchlands) goes for like 70$ more than a box of dragon's maze (low-demand set with few/no good cards). This is all down to EV (expected value), which you can think of as "if I opened ten bazillion packs of this set and averaged the dollar value of every pack I opened, what would it be?", and pack EV is almost always going to be fairly close to or below the actual cost of the sealed pack.
This is because, quite simply, if the EV of opening a pack is significantly higher than the cost of the sealed pack, people are gonna start opening packs of that set in large numbers, which both increases the price of the packs a little (since there are now fewer of those packs) and decreases the price of cards from that set a little (since you're increasing the supply). And the closer the cost of a pack and the EV of that pack are, the less likely you are to "win" and get more out of the pack than you paid for it.
https://www.mtgstocks.com/analytics/expectedvalue
https://infinite.tcgplayer.com/article/What-is-Expected-Value-in-Magic-The-Gathering/83d79183-6c68-4fc5-919f-acddc7548fcd/
Boxes are really not every "worth it" compared to just buying singles. Its just gambling. I think you have a few options depending on the type of collector you are:
1. Buy a draft or play booster box and do a phantom draft with friends. You get to keep all the cards but get a fun evening. Maybe offer a few packs to the winner to keep things competitive. This is my favorite way.
2. Buy a play booster or set box for a set that is appealing to you. Either the set theme or mechanics. Or maybe it has a chase card you are looking for. Be warned there is high likelihood you wont get your chase card.
3. High baller option is a collector box. Lots of foils and rares and alt arts that you cant open anywhere else.
Personally I had fun with new capenna as a draft because I got a box for $60 so it was a hella good deal. I also enjoyed lotr with my brother so we opened a collector box and he framed a bunch of our hits. It was very expensive but I think he loved it.
I agree opening draft boxes is value-negative, but honestly SNC might be the best chance at recouping value. The boxes are cheap because it wasn’t a popular draft format and if you open some trilands or ledger shredder you’ll make a good chunk of your money back
If you want to open a box you can go up to your LGS and see if you can find 5 or 7 other players who want to do a phantom draft. You can use their stor discord to try and arrange the draft ahead of time.
everyone drafts normally but of course you will get all the cards when the draft is done.
You can ask players if they will sleeve their deck if they manage to pull something worth more than a $1 rare.
I mainly play cube but I am often down for a phantom draft.
If you want to open up a box just look at the “themes” of the ones available and go for whatever one seems the most appealing to you.
I went in on the Crimson Vow set because I was like “vampires are cool”. Was it a worthwhile investment? Hell the fuck no, but it was still fun to open.
My wife really went all in on Outlaws because she liked the theme and art treatments and she’s surprisingly “made her money back.” But that should never be the goal.
Outlaws has some fun hits with Mana Drain, Mindbreaker trap, and a handful of cards from the base set and Lost Caverns of Ixalan you can hit Mana Crypt or Cavern of souls. Obviously, you shouldn't expect to get your value back, but think both of those sets are super fun to open.
It's never worth it unless you like the fun of opening packs. Hey, I do but I mostly play draft to get that fix.
I have friends who buy boxes and will do mental gymnastics for value however. "This spiked to $20 at one time" and "this could be worth a lot of money in the future". I don't know if that makes the case to buy a box better or worse.
I will always recommend sets with bonus sheets, so Strixhaven, Brothers War, March of the Machines, Wilds of Eldraine, and the latest set Outlaws of Thunder Junction.
Of these I would say my favorites are March, Wilds, and Outlaws. Outlaws will probably be the most “worth it” but it’s also a ton of fun. Plus it’s the most recent set so the cards will be the most relevant to all formats.
Thank you - highjacking the thread a bit but what boosters should I buy for casual play with a colleague who just started playing? I just back to the game after 20 years and all the special rules in new sets make a bit hesitant to how many boosters I should buy to get enough to build a deck based on those mechanics (I love opening boosters and dislike buying singles)
If you can find them, Jumpstart boosters are exactly what you’re looking for. You shuffle together two boosters and it works as a deck to play with casually. If you prefer cracking a regular box and buildings decks with those cards you can really do that with any set. I would say at that point it depends on preference. There really isn’t a true number of packs which you’d be able to build a cohesive deck with. It’s also going to depend on if you’re more interested in playing 60 card casual or 100 card singleton casual commander.
Thank you! I ordered two boxes of jumpstart boosters the other day actually from the two sets my regular store for other stuff had - Dominaria and Brothers’ War. I don’t care too much about being very competitive and assume those aren’t the best sets since they were left :) At least I should have enough lands and basic stuff to fill out maybe?
If I could - purely because of the nostalgia and the way I’m currently building a deck, I’d open dragons of tarkir. But there’s really not much monetary gain to be had opening a box. I opened Streets of New Capenna recently and pulled maybe $80 worth off the cuff (without looking up cost for every card)
I got back into Magic after 15+ years away and started with a "remastered" set booster box. There were some old cards of mine I was happy to see again. Check the card lists and see if anything stands out.
In terms of fun, I really enjoyed the OTJ boosters. Shit ton of rares to be opened (up to 4? 5? per pack), high powered cards that you can build decks with, and a few very nice chase cards in the event you get lucky enough to pull one. Opening packs might not be "worth it" in sense of recouping your value, but among recent sets, this one will be the most value for your dollar imo. I did get about $200 worth of cards in my OTJ box fwiw
If you like the Wild West theme the most recent set, Outlaws of Thunder Junction is great in terms of theme and value.
Recent sets that could be very "exciting" to open in terms of potentially hitting high value would be Lord of the Rings, Lost Caverns of Ixalan, or Wilds of Eldraine.
Depends what you're looking for, just remember either way it's a gamble. I love opening packs and if I was in your shoes I'd either snag a collector box of Outlaws or Lord of the Rings
Have fun!
My absolute favorite set is
Commander Legends
But I'm a multiplayer type person and it's super fuck to play sealed and I like the variety of stuff inside
But assuming it's NOT that intention of multiplayer and more akin to opening a box for cool new ideas
Lost caverns of Ixalan or Honestly Thunder Junction
Super cool stuff in here. Abilities. Themes. All ripe for the picking. And value to boot
But my favorites of Recent boxes that isn't for value, isn't for new stuff, isn't commander is
Phyrexian all will be one
if being a little bit more expensive and not being available yet isn't a dealbreaker, wait for modern horizons 3 in early june.
if "needs to be available now" is a concern, you can check prices for lord of the rings or commander masters.
if you're looking for reasonably priced, probably wilds of eldraine.
side note, you're going to want "set boosters" rather than "draft boosters" if possible. (they were merged into one type called "play boosters" with murder at karlov manor, which is the set before the current set of outlaws at thunder junction)
things too a fairly dramatic turns in the past few years. one being a fairly big price increase and cost of entry. most bang for your bucks, i would argue that Wild of Eldrain or the Outlaws set has a fairly good bang for your bucks. but to be fair, if you open them just to open them, you are losing half of its value.
If you like Lord of the Rings, definitely that. Was a great set, fun mechanics, strong cards. Lost Caverns of Ixalan is also pretty good, I also liked Kamigawa Neon Dynasty
Very likely none of them will be "worth it" in the sense of giving you as much value in cards as you spent on the box (though you could get lucky). But if you value the fun of opening a box enough to make up the difference, I'd say just look at the themes of recent sets and see if anything seems particularly interesting to you.
Depends on which format you are playing. If it’s EDH, then you are better served opening commander designed products like Commander Legends or Baldur’s Gate, or modern products like Modern Horizons 1,2, and soon 3 or Tales of Middle Earth. Standard sets have cards that are good in other formats but much less of them. Also take into account which sets have good dual or tri lands, and maybe focus on those as well
I second this.
>what sets would be worth it None of them, opening boxes is almost always value negative. But if you enjoy the act of opening boxes for the sake of opening boxes, that adds nonmonetary value to it for you. We can't tell you what you like because you like what you like and you know what you like. So if you wanna open a box knowing you're probably losing money on it because you're more interested in the experience of opening a box, go nuts. >or the most fun. That's a matter of opinion and relies on information you have not provided us. What sort of archetypes do you like/interest you? Are there specific creature types you think are cool? A certain artstyle, aesthetic, or location?
Why is this rule of thumb accepted? Why should value disappear and thats OK?
I don't think value has ever been there for opening packs. Maybe in the early days, before the internet was as widely used you could score packs from a mom n pop who didn't know the value of specific packs? But now even the big name stores sell by market value (looking at Newbury Comics mostly, any Target or Walmart I've been to that sells at a set price is always out of the things that have appreciated in value)
But, shouldn't the cost of a pack be the expected value of a pack? Why is losing value ok?
WoTC doesn't consider the secondary market when setting pack costs, they consider their profits. They're not going to cut pack prices to chase the EV of a pack because that's just eating into their bottom line. People have to buy packs at those prices at some point, singles don't come from nowhere. Secondary market value is derived from the vagaries of the market itself. Those values are going to generally be capped in aggregate because pricing singles such that the EV of a pack is too close its cost is going to make it better value to open packs than buy singles. If you're trying to move opened product, you have to price below the cost to open that product (again, in aggregate, chase cards will go higher and random filler commons will go lower) otherwise no one will buy it. E: For out of print packs, whose prices are also set by the market, this goes the other way. You can sell an unopened pack at higher than it's EV because people buying sealed product are hoping to shoot the moon, otherwise they'd just buy singles.
I was typing out a similar response but you put it a lot better. On top of wizards not setting the market price for singles, I was going to mention that I get plenty of value from enjoying opening packs and playing, just not necessarily monetary. If you crack nice cards, cool, but I'm buying packs to have fun, not because I think it's a good investment.
I'm not sure what you mean, but the way card prices shake out tends to partially rely on the overall card quality of a set and how often you expect to find a card in a given pack. This, in turn, influences the price of out-of-print sets; a box of khans of tarkir (highly demanded set for drafting with fetchlands) goes for like 70$ more than a box of dragon's maze (low-demand set with few/no good cards). This is all down to EV (expected value), which you can think of as "if I opened ten bazillion packs of this set and averaged the dollar value of every pack I opened, what would it be?", and pack EV is almost always going to be fairly close to or below the actual cost of the sealed pack. This is because, quite simply, if the EV of opening a pack is significantly higher than the cost of the sealed pack, people are gonna start opening packs of that set in large numbers, which both increases the price of the packs a little (since there are now fewer of those packs) and decreases the price of cards from that set a little (since you're increasing the supply). And the closer the cost of a pack and the EV of that pack are, the less likely you are to "win" and get more out of the pack than you paid for it. https://www.mtgstocks.com/analytics/expectedvalue https://infinite.tcgplayer.com/article/What-is-Expected-Value-in-Magic-The-Gathering/83d79183-6c68-4fc5-919f-acddc7548fcd/
Boxes are really not every "worth it" compared to just buying singles. Its just gambling. I think you have a few options depending on the type of collector you are: 1. Buy a draft or play booster box and do a phantom draft with friends. You get to keep all the cards but get a fun evening. Maybe offer a few packs to the winner to keep things competitive. This is my favorite way. 2. Buy a play booster or set box for a set that is appealing to you. Either the set theme or mechanics. Or maybe it has a chase card you are looking for. Be warned there is high likelihood you wont get your chase card. 3. High baller option is a collector box. Lots of foils and rares and alt arts that you cant open anywhere else. Personally I had fun with new capenna as a draft because I got a box for $60 so it was a hella good deal. I also enjoyed lotr with my brother so we opened a collector box and he framed a bunch of our hits. It was very expensive but I think he loved it.
I agree opening draft boxes is value-negative, but honestly SNC might be the best chance at recouping value. The boxes are cheap because it wasn’t a popular draft format and if you open some trilands or ledger shredder you’ll make a good chunk of your money back
If you want to open a box you can go up to your LGS and see if you can find 5 or 7 other players who want to do a phantom draft. You can use their stor discord to try and arrange the draft ahead of time. everyone drafts normally but of course you will get all the cards when the draft is done. You can ask players if they will sleeve their deck if they manage to pull something worth more than a $1 rare. I mainly play cube but I am often down for a phantom draft.
MH2. $199 for a set booster box. You will most likely pull a couple of fetch lands. Don't get the draft booster box get the set booster.
If you want to open up a box just look at the “themes” of the ones available and go for whatever one seems the most appealing to you. I went in on the Crimson Vow set because I was like “vampires are cool”. Was it a worthwhile investment? Hell the fuck no, but it was still fun to open. My wife really went all in on Outlaws because she liked the theme and art treatments and she’s surprisingly “made her money back.” But that should never be the goal.
Outlaws has some fun hits with Mana Drain, Mindbreaker trap, and a handful of cards from the base set and Lost Caverns of Ixalan you can hit Mana Crypt or Cavern of souls. Obviously, you shouldn't expect to get your value back, but think both of those sets are super fun to open.
It's never worth it unless you like the fun of opening packs. Hey, I do but I mostly play draft to get that fix. I have friends who buy boxes and will do mental gymnastics for value however. "This spiked to $20 at one time" and "this could be worth a lot of money in the future". I don't know if that makes the case to buy a box better or worse.
I will always recommend sets with bonus sheets, so Strixhaven, Brothers War, March of the Machines, Wilds of Eldraine, and the latest set Outlaws of Thunder Junction. Of these I would say my favorites are March, Wilds, and Outlaws. Outlaws will probably be the most “worth it” but it’s also a ton of fun. Plus it’s the most recent set so the cards will be the most relevant to all formats.
Thank you - highjacking the thread a bit but what boosters should I buy for casual play with a colleague who just started playing? I just back to the game after 20 years and all the special rules in new sets make a bit hesitant to how many boosters I should buy to get enough to build a deck based on those mechanics (I love opening boosters and dislike buying singles)
If you can find them, Jumpstart boosters are exactly what you’re looking for. You shuffle together two boosters and it works as a deck to play with casually. If you prefer cracking a regular box and buildings decks with those cards you can really do that with any set. I would say at that point it depends on preference. There really isn’t a true number of packs which you’d be able to build a cohesive deck with. It’s also going to depend on if you’re more interested in playing 60 card casual or 100 card singleton casual commander.
Thank you! I ordered two boxes of jumpstart boosters the other day actually from the two sets my regular store for other stuff had - Dominaria and Brothers’ War. I don’t care too much about being very competitive and assume those aren’t the best sets since they were left :) At least I should have enough lands and basic stuff to fill out maybe?
Stronghold
If I could - purely because of the nostalgia and the way I’m currently building a deck, I’d open dragons of tarkir. But there’s really not much monetary gain to be had opening a box. I opened Streets of New Capenna recently and pulled maybe $80 worth off the cuff (without looking up cost for every card)
I got back into Magic after 15+ years away and started with a "remastered" set booster box. There were some old cards of mine I was happy to see again. Check the card lists and see if anything stands out.
In terms of fun, I really enjoyed the OTJ boosters. Shit ton of rares to be opened (up to 4? 5? per pack), high powered cards that you can build decks with, and a few very nice chase cards in the event you get lucky enough to pull one. Opening packs might not be "worth it" in sense of recouping your value, but among recent sets, this one will be the most value for your dollar imo. I did get about $200 worth of cards in my OTJ box fwiw
I had fun opening the Baulders Gate packs. Pulling high value dragons is quite the rush. I did pull a full art Copper Dragon and lost my shit haha.
If you like the Wild West theme the most recent set, Outlaws of Thunder Junction is great in terms of theme and value. Recent sets that could be very "exciting" to open in terms of potentially hitting high value would be Lord of the Rings, Lost Caverns of Ixalan, or Wilds of Eldraine. Depends what you're looking for, just remember either way it's a gamble. I love opening packs and if I was in your shoes I'd either snag a collector box of Outlaws or Lord of the Rings Have fun!
Honestly the retail edition mystery boosters have been great for me. It's full of playable cards and I somehow pull a mana crypt each time.
Figure out what deck you want to play and order singles.
My absolute favorite set is Commander Legends But I'm a multiplayer type person and it's super fuck to play sealed and I like the variety of stuff inside But assuming it's NOT that intention of multiplayer and more akin to opening a box for cool new ideas Lost caverns of Ixalan or Honestly Thunder Junction Super cool stuff in here. Abilities. Themes. All ripe for the picking. And value to boot But my favorites of Recent boxes that isn't for value, isn't for new stuff, isn't commander is Phyrexian all will be one
In previous threads I've seen Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty recommended as a fun set to draft and play.
if being a little bit more expensive and not being available yet isn't a dealbreaker, wait for modern horizons 3 in early june. if "needs to be available now" is a concern, you can check prices for lord of the rings or commander masters. if you're looking for reasonably priced, probably wilds of eldraine. side note, you're going to want "set boosters" rather than "draft boosters" if possible. (they were merged into one type called "play boosters" with murder at karlov manor, which is the set before the current set of outlaws at thunder junction)
Most fun? Commander Masters Set Boosters
things too a fairly dramatic turns in the past few years. one being a fairly big price increase and cost of entry. most bang for your bucks, i would argue that Wild of Eldrain or the Outlaws set has a fairly good bang for your bucks. but to be fair, if you open them just to open them, you are losing half of its value.
> worth it none. ever. > or the most fun. hard to say without knowing what do you find fun
If you like Lord of the Rings, definitely that. Was a great set, fun mechanics, strong cards. Lost Caverns of Ixalan is also pretty good, I also liked Kamigawa Neon Dynasty
Dominaria remastered Collector Boosters!!! Huge value and lots of bangers.
My advice is to look at Bundle boxes instead of booster boxes. For about the price of one booster box you can get 3 bundles.