All-Foil Boosters - Alara Block

[Minion]

Sounds too good to be true right?

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazin...ily/arcana/287

Here's a small excerpt from the page:

Stories are told of boosters with all rares, or all foil premium cards. But those stories are strictly rumors. Legends. Tales told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Until now.

Take one last trip to Alara and collect all 539 foil premium cards, in this handsome foil booster. Each of these boosters contains fifteen foil, black-bordered cards from Shards of Alara, Conflux, and Alara Reborn.
These boosters will be available for a limited time, starting on January 8, 2010. And they're only $11.99

[Zazirik]

Meh.

This excites me less than Planechase because I absolutely hate foils (aside from one instance ).

[Coldstone]

Is there really a point to doing this? I thought people weren't that pleased with Alara block?

[Arix]

I'm going to assume it was finalised long before the Magic community let loose a collective sigh of "meh" towards Alara block. I also doubt this will end at Alara block.

Frankly, I'll pass on these altogether.

[FuDaWg45]

This little idea will likely flop. 12 bucks for a booster? Sure you may hit a nice rare, but most rares even in foil don't top out at 12 bucks.

[Coldstone]

Originally Posted by FuDaWg45

This little idea will likely flop. 12 bucks for a booster? Sure you may hit a nice rare, but most rares even in foil don't top out at 12 bucks.

That's what happens when you have a block where only a dozen rares or so ever topped the $10 mark.

[Drathro]

Not that I care, because I don't like foils, but on the other side of things, even common foils are usually priced at ~ 0.50 and uncommon and basic land foils ~$1.00. With a normal distribution of ordinary foils, that's ~$9 plus a foil rare. Mind you, this is based on a normal distribution. Extra foils like this could alter these normal values.

Also, with the exception of lately at MDV, I've only seen people happy with Alara block, including myself.

[Minion]

I collect foils, so I guess I'll have to pick a few of these up.

[reapandplant]

for reference, this is 3 times the price of a normal booster, but foils have only 1 in 5 chance.so basically, you're getting your foils at a discount.

[Kamahl's Disciple]

Originally Posted by Drathro

Also, with the exception of lately at MDV, I've only seen people happy with Alara block, including myself.

Count me in on that too, I was mostly pleased with the Alara Block myself.

That being said, I don't think I will buy more then a couple boosters of this promotion of theirs, just to see if I get anything good.

[CoglineErro]

Originally Posted by Coldstone

Is there really a point to doing this? I thought people weren't that pleased with Alara block?

Not accurate. Alara Block was quite popular as it is multicolor. Not as much as Ravnica (WOuld have been a better and more awesome choice, of course), but popular nonetheless. Add in that foil, premium cards are big hits at the casual table and you have a big seller. One of my exgirlfriends would only play with a "pretty" deck, meaning all foils. I see this being an obscene profit maker, especially with little kids who wanna when their friends show off their foil whatever card to show off their eleven foil whatever cards right back (Including a foil rare OMG!!!) and such.

[Tekkactus]

Foils are pointless. Only collectors are willing to pay extra for a card that has no additional play value to a nonfoil, they curl which makes them a pain to play with unsleeved (which some of us, surprisingly enough, still do), and people typically overvalue them in trades.

Why does Wizards think we love them so much? The only upside is the double rare part.

[FuDaWg45]

Originally Posted by Tekkactus

they curl

This little feature makes me hate them, actually. I like my cards as straight as possible - I've even thrown out brand new sleeves I bought because I thought they were too bent and would bend my cards.

[ChampionKitsune]

I really don't like foils--they curl, and the shinyness just makes it harder to see the picture (art in Magic these days is rarely anything less than amazing).

I guess you could get two rares or more, but there isn't a guarantee you'd necessarily get any rares at all, much less valuable rares/mythics. These are so much more of a gamble than regular boosters. And unless you're a crazy collector or turn absolutely every card you get over to the secondary market, you'd do better to get three regular packs than one of these things.

And if anyone cares, I thought the 3-color theme of Alara was a kind of too many colors. Invasion was good, Ravnica was triumphant, Shadowmoor was okay, but now design space is growing kinda thin...and so many Shards/Conflux cards were weak as hell anyway. That said, I lurved Alara Reborn

[cuddly_cultist]

I loved Alara, but I hate foils.