It’s July, and we’re in a brave new world. In less than two weeks (July 16) the MTGO client we have all come to know and, well, tolerate, will be replaced with the Wide Beta. Brace yourself.

At the same time we have an awesome lineup of MTGO products coming our way. Vintage Masters drafts and sealed Check. Vintage and Legacy events that are firing with VMA payouts? Check. M15 Pre-release and Release events. Check. Magic Online 12^th Anniversary Events? Whoa, didn’t see those coming—pretty sweet.

In other words, a great variety of exciting offerings adrift on a flawed platform. It reminds me a bit of that Carnival cruise ship that got stranded last year in the Caribbean. Tropical climate, all you can eat buffet, three decks with swimming pools and organized recreation…but no air conditioning, elevators, and toilets.

Yeah, that’s kinda what I’m expecting. (As an aside, if you haven’t read the brilliant David Foster Wallace essay, “A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again,” I recommend checking it out.)

We’ve discussed in the past what effect the v3 shutoff will have, but it’s worth mentioning again. The cards at the greatest risk are older cards with no link to the paper market. Anything still redeemable has a floor under it (and THS/BNG/JOU and RTR/GTC/DGM cards are pretty much near that floor anyway.) The riskier commodities are Modern and Legacy cards, which have recently seen a resurgence but could be on the wrong end of the stick if v4 is poorly received.

I wouldn’t rush to sell off your small items, but you may want to pare back some of your big ticket rares. I am keeping playsets of cards I am gaming with but have liquidated a lot of my excess Legacy and Vintage cards. Liquidity will be important since I expect some nice bargains during M15 release events.

Update on VMA Prices

Vintage Masters will be on sale in the store until September but until recently we did not know what types of Limited events would be offered. Wizards has been--and remains--noncommittal.

Initially, the only details on the release page noted that, "After the downtime on July 2, a selection of Limited Events will continue for a period of time. You'll be able to purchase Vintage Masters boosters until the release of Khans of Tarkir. There will also be Constructed Vintage events!” They said further details would be announced on Monday, June 9, but that announcement was clear as mud.

In my article last week I predicted the phase out of some of the on-demand events after July 2. Based on this possibility I argued that last weekend could be a good time to buy because the upside outweighed the downside. After all, VMA mythics and rares were at a new floor, and a reduction in on-demand drafts and sealed could create an upsurge in prices.

Well, it was been confirmed that VMA events will continue as usual, at least until the next downtime. That means VMA drafts will still fire and the Swiss Sealed queues will also be available. As a result, the floor has continued to drop--especially on the Power 9.

Rares have dropped as well, and are now sitting at the lowest so far. Meanwhile, VMA will continue to be heavily opened for at least another week (and possibly indefinitely.)

What Does the Future Hold?

I still think they may consider shutting off on-demand VMA events during the M15 Pre-release and Release window, starting with the Modern Masters/Holiday Cube next week. It would be unprecedented to have MMA, Cube, VMA, and regular limited events plus the 12^th Anniversary events, all firing at once.

A thread in the Classic Quarter noted a comment from an (unnamed) Wizards employee: "VMA events will continue through the holiday weekend. We haven't announced yet the end dates for all VMA events yet, but the Vintage events will be running through the weekend. : D"

If they temporarily shut off VMA on-demand events at the next downtime we should see a short-term bump in VMA prices. But in the meantime there will be continued downward pressure on all VMA cards, especially rares, as more and more packs get opened. We are not yet at the floor, and that "floor" may not occur until the v3 switchover--which could create a new floor for a wide variety of cards.

What to Do?

Last week I recommended buying some rares that had dropped to attractive prices on the possibility that the rate of VMA opens would slow. In the long run I think these will be fine specs, but in the short run prices will continue to drop. My apologies if you took a hit. It’s not clear whether we’ll get any benefit from selling now and rebuying since we need to cover the spread for it to be worthwhile.

I would be very careful about holding VMA cards at the moment. They will be under pressure both from continued opening and from the v3 switchover. Despite the attractive prices, I am not going to buy any new VMA cards until after the switchover.

Modern Masters Returns

We also have a week of Modern Masters coming. Every time MMA queues have been firing, it’s been a great opportunity to pick up Modern staples at a discount. These MMA drafts coincide with the v3 shutdown (and with a variety of other MTGO offerings) so it will be interesting to see how the market responds. Will people draft MMA? Will people sell off Modern if prices start to slide?

If prices drop, this will be a great chance to target some of the evergreen specs that make up the bread and butter of our speculation portfolio. Here are some cards I’ll be keeping a close eye on:

The best time to buy will probably be July 20^th, after a heavy weekend of drafting.

12^th Anniversary Events

[pullquote]Don’t rush out and sell your cards from these sets and then hope to rebuy[/pullquote]Did you notice something strange about the 12th Anniversary events announcement (other than references to egg nog in July)? Turns out the Sealed events are paying out in packs from the same sets, but no drafts are available to use that prize product.

I don’t know if this has ever been done before. Yes, you can use packs as entry for those sealed events, but there are only four of them per day.

What are people supposed to do with their excess prize packs? As we know, the value of these virtual packs is not based on the cards inside them but on their usability as entry in events. Everyone is going to be trying to unload these, so prices will plummet.

And most of these boosters weren’t worth much to begin with. (Note that booster prices for those sets may rise in the morning, but once prizes get issued they will fall steeply. Once those events are done, the boosters are basically worthless until the next flashback for that set rolls around.)

If for some reason you are holding boosters in these sets, ditch them now. And if you’d like to play, be sure to buy in via boosters rather than through tix.

Here is the event schedule. These are poor value because the prize packs will be stranded in your collection, but can still be a lot of fun:

7/2         3 Innistrad and 3 Dark Ascension booster packs.
7/3         2 Scars of Mirrodin, 2 Mirrodin Besieged, and 2 New Phyrexia booster packs.
7/4         6 Rize of the Eldrazi booster packs.
7/5         3 Zendikar and 3 Worldwake booster packs.
7/6         2 Shards of Alara, 2 Conflux, and 2 Alara Reborn booster packs.
7/7         3 Shadowmoor and 3 Eventide booster packs.
7/8         3 Lorwyn and 3 Morningtide booster packs.
7/9         2 Time Spiral, 2 Planar Chaos, and 2 Future Sight booster packs.
7/10       2 Ravnica, 2 Guildpact, and 2 Dissension booster packs.
7/11       2 Champions of Kamigawa, 2 Betrayers of Kamigawa, and 2 Saviors
7/12       2 Mirrodin, 2 Darksteel, and 2 Fifth Dawn booster packs.
7/13       2 Onslaught, 2 Legions, and 2 Scourge booster packs.
7/14       2 Odyssey, 2 Torment, and 2 Judgment booster packs.
7/15       2 Invasion, 2 Planeshift, and 2 Apocalypse booster packs.

Will these events drop the price of cards in these sets? These are “flashbacks” in name only, since they will provide an extremely limited quantity of new supply. This is not like when we have a week of drafting of these formats, so don’t rush out and sell your cards from these sets and then hope to rebuy. To give one example: Innistrad-Dark Ascension fired Wednesday and only led to a 2% drop in the ISD index and no decline in DKA index. These are not significant changes compared to regular market noise.

The Holiday Cube

The Holiday Cube returns on Wednesday, July 16 and runs until Friday, July 25. This is the powered Cube that allows you to do degenerate things. But the EV on Cube events is so bad that I’ll probably stay away—especially when there are so many other exciting opportunities. That said, even with the poor payouts the EV is probably less negative than drafting Vintage Masters...

A Winner for Our Contest

You'll recall that my June 15 article featured a contest to guess the price of a Black Lotus on July 1. It noted that, "For the purpose of this contest, the official price is the price listed on MTGGoldfish for July 1. Whoever is closest to that price will win. The winner will receive a pack of Vintage Masters from me and acclaim from your fellow speculators."

According to MTGGoldfish, the price of a Black Lotus on July 1 was 224 tix. Which means our winner is none other than our very own Sylvain Lehoux. (Sylvain, contact me via chat or in the client to pick up your VMA pack. There's a nonzero chance it contains a Lotus.)

While the MTGGoldfish price put Lotus at 224, copies could be acquired that night for 20 tix lower over at Goatboats. So Chris gets an honorable mention on this one.

Since then prices have continued to drop, and seem to be headed toward the 140-150 tix that was picked out as our "wisdom of the crowd" number. Interesting... If it hits that price I will definitely be a buyer.

Until next week, enjoy the celebration and double check with your cruise director that the lavatories will be functional.

-Alexander Carl (@thoughtlaced)