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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Staffan" data-source="post: 9749667" data-attributes="member: 907">Maybe. If you look at the Magic side, they're doing some stuff that's... maybe not shady, but not exactly customer-friendly, and which I think are bad for the long-term health of the game.A few years back, Wizards started entering into licensing agreements with other companies to make "Universes Beyond" sets – adaptions of various IPs to Magic. They've done things like Warhammer 40K, Assassin's Creed, Lord of the Rings, and Doctor Who, and some occasions of just making a handful of cards released as overpriced Secret Lairs (Spongebob Squarepants, Sonic the Hedgehog, various others). These cards were originally not legal for Standard or Modern (Standard is what's supposed to be their flagship format where you can play cards from the last few years, though it's been edged out by the more casual multi-player Commander format, and Modern is a format where you can play all but the most ancient cards), because they were cautious about "Fortniteing" their own IP. Universes Beyond sets have usually been more expensive than regular sets, partially because of license fees and partially because they can.Recently, they changed this policy so the current and future Universes Beyond sets are treated as regular sets for Standard and Modern legality, starting with Final Fantasy which was released earlier this year. Final Fantasy is also widely considered to have a higher power level than Magic normally has... so they're now selling higher-powered cards at a higher price. They kind of did this earlier with some sets designed to push cards straight into Modern or Commander without going through Standard, but now they're doing it for Standard as well. In addition, that means you have more sets released for Standard – six sets this year, as opposed to the normal four, three of which are Universes Beyond sets (Final Fantasy, Spider-Man, and Avatar: The Last Airbender). This both means you need to spend a lot more money if you want to keep up, and that there's less time to play with one set's new cards before they start the heavy publicity push for the next one (because there are two months instead of three between sets, and UB sets tend to get more publicity).I've seen a lot of online creators complain about this – they might be excited about individual new cards, and think those cards do fun things that capture the theme of what the subject is about (for example, J. Jonah Jameson's card has the rules text "Whenever a creature you control with menace attacks, create a Treasure token." which is a fun play on the classic "Spider-Man: Threat or Menace?" headline), but they feel they don't have the time to absorb things before being hit with something new. The latest release was Edge of Eternities, which was an in-universe set with a science-fiction-fantasy theme, which had some absolutely stellar (heh) worldbuilding, but it's been completely overshadowed both publicity- and powerwise by the surrounding Final Fantasy and Spider-Man sets.But commercially, this has been a triumph. I'm making a note here, great success. It's hard to overstate their satisfaction. Final Fantasy has been the best-selling set ever – partially because they're selling to both Magic players and Final Fantasy aficionados, and partially because it has some absolutely bonkers cards in it. So this will probably continue, to the detriment of the actual game.So far, we haven't seen this happen with D&D. Whatever outside tie-ins there have been have been minor things like Stranger Things or Acquisitions Inc.. I don't think we'll see this particular thing happening with D&D. Partially because D&D's business model has generally been focused around primarily selling core books with other books basically being self-sustaining advertisements for the core, but also because D&D doesn't have the competitive element Magic does – while some Magic players might be willing to pay $35 (or up to $85 for a fancier version) for <a href="https://scryfall.com/card/fin/248/vivi-ornitier" target="_blank">Vivi Ornitier</a>, I don't see anyone willing to shell out $20 for a single feat or spell in D&D. But when we see Wizards bosses start talking about increasing D&D's monetization, it's hard not to look at what they've done with Magic and wonder how they'll apply that kind of thinking to D&D.</blockquote>

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