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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Meech17" data-source="post: 9387655" data-attributes="member: 7044459">Kind of... There was a point in time where they were print-to-order.So they put up the listing for one month or whatever and any number of people could order a set, and then a couple weeks/months later they would ship. It was very much like Kickstarter or other crowdfunding then. They've since quit doing this however.Price is going to vary. Sometimes it's a very good deal. Typically a Secret Lair is 4-5 cards, for $30, or $40 for the foiled version. Sometimes the value is easy to determine right from the get-go. It might be a card that has not been reprinted in a long time, and the price has gone up, so it ends up being a good deal. There are super drops where there will be more cards, or collections of multiple Secret Lairs for higher prices, and they've even done entire decks, but the standard offering is the bundle of 4-5 cards for $30-$40.Sometimes it looks like a better deal than it is. There will be a card included that has a high market price, but it's not because it's a sought after card, but really it's some weird card, that was only ever printed once, and there just isn't much supply available for it. I'm on the fence about Secret Lairs. They are usually great showcases for the artists involved.. They are also often usually aimed at the Commander Format, which is a singleton game mode, where your deck is made up of 100, unique cards. (As compared to traditional constructed MTG formats where you use 60 card decks, made up of multiple copies of core cards.) Commander is often considered a format for self expression and the special art is desirable for that effect. Here's a fun example. I'm sorry I can't post images because I'm at work. Maybe I'll come back and edit this on my phone where the mean old IT people can't block me from goofing off. There's an Artist who goes by Wizard of Barge. They make some really fun art that I'm a big fan of. They were given a Secret Lair called Goblin & Squabblin'. As you'd expect it's all Goblin themed. It included 5 cards. I'll write up below the price you can purchase all of these cards for on the secondary market, going off of TCGPlayer.com pricing. They are (maybe?) the largest market for TCG cards online in the US. Many LGSs use them to set their own singles prices. I'll post the cheapest non-secret lair printing I could find, and then what you can buy the secret lair version for, second hand.Shatter Gang Brothers: <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Regular Market Price: $0.20 </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Wizard of Barge Secret Lair: $3</li> </ul>Goblin Matron:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Reg: $0.15</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">SL: $15</li> </ul>Goblin Lackey:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Reg: $15</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">SL: $20</li> </ul>Goblin Recruiter:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Reg: $7</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">SL: $19</li> </ul>Muxus, Goblin Grandee:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Reg: $8</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">SL: $26</li> </ul>So if you just wanted all of these cards on their own, it'd run you around ~$30, which is what the SL originally cost. So ultimately, not a bad deal.. It's also worth noting, prior to this printing, some of these prices were probably a little higher. Muxus for instance is a card that was only ever printed in one set, and he is a decent choice to be the commander of a Goblin Themed Commander deck. So at it's peak, that card was worth about $13-14, and the SL printing essentially doubled the supply of these cards and drove that price down. For the argument as to whether or not they're whale bait.. I can't really say that they aren't. It's a hot product, in limited supply that is almost guaranteed to go up in value. They are available for limited windows of time to drive maximum FOMO. If you browse places like Facebook Market Place you can often find people selling a bunch of Secret Lairs still in the sealed cardboard envelopes they ship in. Obviously these people purchased them with the intention of flipping them. I don't particularly like the speculation/investment side of Magic. I look at it as a game first, and hate how expensive some of these cards can get.   Another issue with Secret Lairs is that they bypass Game Stores. WOTC sells them direct, and now apparently through D&DBeyond. Game Stores are the backbone of paper magic, and if WOTC continues to find ways to carve bigger pieces of the pie out for themselves leaving the LGSs and the players as the ones picking at crumbs, we'll continue to see declines in paper magic. It's already to the point where no one plays Standard in paper any more. I put together a standard deck, but there's no where I can play it within a half hour drive, and I live in a major metro area with quite a few game stores in that radius. So Ultimately I'm torn. I like the fact that they act as artist showcases.. I like that they can be used as tools to reprint needed cards. I like that they are themed, and can be used as inspiration for building fun commander decks. I don't like they way they are sold and monetized however. They should go back to print to demand, they shouldn't be afraid to re-print popular SLs, and they need to find a way to rope gamestores into the ecosystem.</blockquote>

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