When considering the perspective of a person who has no knowledge of MTGO, the idea that a digital card game could be a sound investment seems foolish at best. I’m sure many of you have argued with nonbelievers over the MTGO economy, and truthfully, getting them to understand the benefits of spending their hard earned cash can prove to be very challenging. The key in winning this argument is establishing the ticket as a legitimate and exchangeable form of currencyThe validity of the ticket can be reinforced by the consistently growing popularity of MTGO in addition to the multiple years of the game and company’s success. The financial geniuses at wizards will always be able to profit from their proven system which employs a constant stream of new products. This keeps the economy from going stale by creating a constant demand for their new products and therefore a steady demand for tickets. Since the value of tickets strictly revolves around a single product you are left with very few variables in the business plan, resulting in a very small and specific economy. This type of economy is very easy to keep sustained and there are no reasons to assume it won’t be. Any economist who was familiar with MTGO would agree with me in saying that the ticket is a real and safe form of currency.
The one concept that interferes with this idea of validity would be the unconventional method of currency exchange. While the classifieds have a select few individuals who promote a direct USD exchange you have nothing but their word on a fair trade. This risk can be tempered by breaking up the trade into multiple small transactions but it always feels a bit sketchy. I imagine this is a big deterrence for most, but there is also another unconventional method via set redemption. MTGO cards generally have a lower value than their paper counterparts, so in theory, an exchange rate of more than 1 USD per ticket is possible. Since most people can’t sell the redeemed cards for top price this is generally not the case, but a reasonable exchange rate can still be achieved. It is a fair assumption that you will almost always lose a percentage of your money when exchanging tickets for cash, but the same applies when exchanging any currencies. Most of the MTGO community only plays for fun, so this isn’t a significant loss when comparing it to other hobbies. On the other hand there are the select few who manage to make a consistent profit via trading or through tournament play.
I hope this article helps assure you that having a $500 dollar deck of cards or even a vast $10,000+ collection is just as reasonable as investing in stocks, gold, or even the USD. Not to mention magic is a lot more fun :D.
(Bonus Tip: Buy a handful of Livewire Lash at the $0.12 price tag. It has a great interaction in a newly formed standard UG infect deck, the price could break $1.00 very easily.)
If you enjoyed the article or have any questions feel free to let me know, via AndyBurden on MTGO.
Had to prove this very thing to my wife and dad. They both said that there is no money in this game. 6mo later I showed them my PayPal account. The looks I got was priceless!!!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the tip, i just bought 100 Livewires just to see :)
ReplyDeleteHave you heard about Bitcoins?
ReplyDeleteI actually had a bitcoin mining rig set up for about 2 weeks and I returned it because the difficulty to mine has went up so much, I made some cash but I wish I would have done it a few months earlier... or bought a bunch before the huge price increase. I played against the UG infect list in the 3-0 bracket with UB control a few days ago, he had livewire lash on blighted agent and I cast go for the throat on it. He then cast vines of vastwood, so 4 infect from the ability, then 7 infect from the attack. The deck is a bit gimmicky but its so cheap... I think it will catch on once people start seeing the list.
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