Has WotC Retired/Canceled Signature Spellbook and Commander Collection?
General forum
Posted on Oct. 22, 2022, 10:28 a.m. by DemonDragonJ
The Signature Spellbook series was intended to be a successor to From the Vault, addressing the issues that the previous series had, but there has been no news regarding that series in quite some time, so I worry that WotC has canceled or retired that product line, which would be very unfortunate, since I believe that it was an excellent series, and there are so many more characters who could be featured in such a product.
Also, there has been no news about whether or not the Commander Collection series shall continue, which would also be unfortunate, since I feel that that is another excellent series, as well.
What does everyone else say about this? Has WotC canceled or retired the Signature Spellbook and Commander Collection series?
^Basically this. It's kind of sad because Wizards loves doing things in cycles and now both of these will likely remain unfinished...
October 22, 2022 2:28 p.m.
Dead_Blue_ says... #4
I’m still salty they discontinued the arena of the planeswalkers board game
October 22, 2022 2:41 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #5
Delphen7, I am not pleased to hear that, since Secret Lairs are a greedy and predatory business model, with how each product is available only for a limited time and also with how they can be purchased only directly from WotC; in most situations, I would be glad to eliminate the middle-man, but not in this situation, since I like to support local game stores.
October 23, 2022 8:02 a.m.
Saying that Secret Lairs are a predatory business model is not a great defence to the possible* discontinuation of Commander Collections. The Commander Collection series was rife with its own predatory behaviour - the Green collection, for example, was $50.00 MSRP, but ended up selling for around $100.00 each.
Why? Retailers can take the price of the secondary market into account when setting how much they sell products for, so the series ended up retailing for the secondary market value of the cards it fountained, rather than MSRP. This means the collections were not that much different than buying singles in terms of cost, which also meant they did not significantly reduce the cost of the cards they fountained long-term.
The fact the products’ street price was much higher than the price Wizards intended likely factored into their decision to deprioritise the Commander Collection products. They found themselves in a catch-22 situation - they could either include cards everyone wanted, then have the product be subjected to price gouging by stores, or they could include lesser cards and have the product be a dud. Neither of those situations are good for Wizards or for the customer.
So it is hardly surprising they focused more on Secret Lairs - not only are they better for Wizards’ bottom line, they allow customers to buy bundles of cards for Wizards’ intended price, even if that price is lower than secondary market value for the cards.
- I say “possible” discontinuation because 2020-2022 have been a weird time for the printing business. Wizards has been pretty forward about how pandemic staffing difficulties have made production more difficult, how Inflation has hit Magic pretty hard, and how the supply chain difficulties have reduced production capabilities. It is quite possible Wizards has deprioritised these products during this time of difficult production, but could bring them back when they do not need to be as careful with how they use limited resources.
October 24, 2022 9:43 a.m.
Caerwyn I think at this point it's pretty clear that Wizards is actively using Commander staple card scarcity and pricing to drive product sales. Just look at Dockside Extortionist. It clearly could have been fit into Battle for Baldur's Gate but they made it a mythic in Double Master's 2022.
October 24, 2022 3:38 p.m.
Abaques - Wizards’ using reprint equity as a factor in which cards are reprinted and when is neither new nor relevant to my post discussing the difference between statically priced products, like Secret Lairs, and statically MSRPed products with dynamic actual pricing due to stores setting their own prices, like Commander Collections. Your response deals with a determination of what product to print for a product - which is a separate issue from the point I made.
October 24, 2022 4:15 p.m.
Dead_Blue_ I am glad it's not just me, I really enjoyed the board game and wished they had given it a little more attention before axing it...
October 26, 2022 10:10 a.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #10
Caerwyn, my main complaint about Secret Lairs is that they are available for only a limited amount of time, which is am egregious example of artificial scarcity, so how is that not predatory? You are not seriously taking the side of the giant corporation over the customers, are you?
October 31, 2022 10:05 p.m.
And if you read my post, you’ll see my complaint is about you calling something predatory when ignoring the fact that the very product you are sad to see go was subject to predatory behavior. It looks a lot like you are trying to throw Wizards under the bus while excusing artificial scarcity and price gouging by third parties.
You’ll note I did not excuse SLs in my post - I just pointed out your double standards.
October 31, 2022 10:27 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #12
Caerwyn, I wish to support my local game stores; how is that a bad thing?
Also, the prices for Secret Lairs are far too high for me to ever purchase them; it costs WotC the same amount of money to print a basic land as it does to print an extremely expensive card, such as Imperial Seal, so I cannot spend money on what I consider to be overpriced products.
November 1, 2022 8:21 p.m.
The price of SLs are around $30.00 for a non-foil, $40.00 for foil. Commander Collection: Green went for $100.00 on an MSRP of $40.00. That means stores were taking a product where they would have turned a profit at $40.00, and decided to add an additional $60.00 of profit on top of that. So, you’ll have to pardon me if I don’t find the “SLs are too expensive” argument when some of the Commander Collection products have retailed for far more.
Now, whether the additional premium is worth supporting your local store is a different situation - but that’s a decision you are making despite them having the ability to price gouge on these products. Frankly, if you want to blame someone for these products being sidelined, you can blame opportunistic store owners who jacked up the price on a product Wizards designed to provide folks useful, popular cards in an affordable manner. Commander Collection: Green was a fiasco thanks to profiteering and showed that these products cannot adequately provide for staple affordability because the secondary sellers will just increase prices to the cards’ value, not use the MSRP price.
You also are simply wrong about a basic and an Imperial Seal costing the same to Wizards. The paper and printing costs might be the same, but spending reprint equity is another cost that has to be factored in, and Imperial Seal has a whole lot more reprint equity they spend when they reprint it.
November 1, 2022 8:57 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #14
Caerwyn, that is a very good point, so I suppose that I can understand why WotC is focusing more strongly on Secret Lairs; is that also why they stopped printing Premium Decks, Duel Decks, and From the Vault?
Also, many players keep mentioning "reprint equity," but do you understand that that is an abstract concept, not a concrete one, as is the cost of printing cards? I do not care one bit about reprint equity; I simply wish for the cards that I enjoy using to be affordable (i.e., I do not need to spend a significant portion of my paycheck on them).
November 1, 2022 9:05 p.m.
I think there are some other problems with Duel Decks (they contained mediocre cards and were not really upgradable, and Wizards has tried to move away from products that are sunk costs where the cards will just collect dust rather than be used long-term), but I expect similar issues killed off From the Vault (or transformed From the Vault into signature spellbooks, then commander collections, and now SLs).
As for your mentioning reprint equity being an abstract concept, you might not see it as a "real" cost, but it is, indeed, a real cost. Burning reprint equity decreases future profits and thus is something Wizards, as a business, needs to take into account. Does it suck for us players that some cards are expensive? Yes. Are there cards that they could probably reprint more often because their cost does not match their power, and thus do not have as much reprint equity as their street price indicates (i.e. cards that are expensive because of supply issues, not demand issues--reprint equity is all about demand)? Absolutely. But, can Wizards just ignore reprint equity and print cards willy nilly? Not if they want to remain in business for the long haul.
Additionally, to show another double standard, you do realize preservation of reprint equity is necessary for the well-being of LGSes that you said you "wish to support"? LGSes have lots of money tied up in cards--and high value cards can sit for a while before they sell. That means that, at any given point, an LGS stands to lose hundreds, if not thousands of dollars if Wizards reprints a card and causes their stockpile to drop in price. Preserving LGSes inventory prices (or not causing them to swing too drastically) is in Wizards' best interest as it ensures there are places folks are playing limited and otherwise buying product.
November 1, 2022 9:31 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #16
Caerwyn, that makes sense, but you still have not addressed the worst part of Secret Lairs: the fact that they are available for only a limited time, thus creating a sense of desperation to purchase them, which definitely artificially increases their value. Surely, you cannot possible defend that practice?
November 1, 2022 9:38 p.m.
I did not address it since it was not relevant to the actual thread topic, but, since you asked, sure. I think the original SLs were a disaster in terms of their being time-limited--they were only around for 24 hours or so, making them feel very much like you had to move it or lose it, in a way that felt like it was trying to take advantage of customer impulses.
However, they have changed that with their bundled releases--you now have a fairly long period of time (several weeks) to make the decision to purchase, so it preys less on impulses. I do not have a problem with how it is now--it's little different than countless other companies that offer limited-time products.
November 1, 2022 9:46 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #18
Caerwyn, that makes sense, so is there anything else remaining to discuss regarding the original topic of this thread?
Delphen7 says... #2
I believe Commander Collection replaced Signature Spellbook because there wasn't enough hype over them, and there hasn't been too much excitement over Commander Collection as far as I'm aware.
I think WoTC has just moved on to Secret Lairs at this point
October 22, 2022 1:08 p.m.