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The MTG finance market is ever shifting. If nothing else, it is one where you need to evaluate and re-evaluate cards in an ever-changing environment. It’s also one where no one really knows what they’re talking about, myself included. An example straight from Reddit a month ago here: Sometimes the experts make the wrong calls…
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Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the Puzzle Box! These last couple weeks have been pretty fun! I know there are at least a few of you who have been trying out the formats I’ve presented here. That is really flattering—thanks, guys! This week, I am going to be continuing of this meta-series (as Mark…
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Welcome back, brewers. Surprise, surprise, today I’m going to talk about GW Scion. It’s been a while since I last wrote about it. In fact, it was before Born of the Gods was even released. Now that the new set has been out for a while and I’ve had a chance to play with it,…
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Do we need it or want it? Let’s be honest. We live in a society where we exaggerate a lot. Our ancestors would be absolutely baffled if they saw us Magic players exclaiming our “need” for foil copies of [card]Misty Rainforest[/card] to finish making our deck of cards look fancy. Hell, they’d be shocked at…
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This is part four of my Inventory Management series. Parts one through three are here, here, and here. Read them first if you haven’t already. I really appreciate the feedback I have been getting and I’m happy to answer questions. Today we’re talking about sunk cost. Sunk cost is not just an inventory management topic,…
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This always feels like a tender topic. The idea of profiting in a trade is enough to make many people steer clear of trading altogether. Just so nobody misconstrues this, I am not talking about taking advantage of someone or “trade-rape” (which seems to be a popular term for it at the LGS). What I…
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Sometimes you just don’t get a very good set of cards in your Sealed pool. Is it possible to salvage these events? How much of Sealed is luck versus skill? Today I go through the worst Sealed event I’ve played in years. It was a Magic 2014 Sealed daily event. Black [Deck title=Black Cards] 1 Altar’s…
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Sweeper effects have been a long-lasting staple in Magic. These effects make aggro players cry and control players gleam. They can make or break a game and trigger the same “ooooh’s” and “ahhhhh’s” Wizards of the Coast (WotC) tried to accomplish with the Miracle mechanic from Avacyn Restored. These game-changers will continue to be…
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Last week I was excited about Standard Magic. For the first time in months, it looked like the face of Standard was changing. This is great for the game, because players who have gotten bored and haven’t shown up to the LGS in a while pop in to try out some new brews. I was…
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[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD58tis9UZ-pZ7zJueXZtZuJ&w=640&h=360] What is Red and Black and Green All Over? This week I had the pleasure of entering a Born of the Gods-Theros-Theros draft with my good friend Grant. Together we worked our way through some exciting picks and equally exciting games. Having a second voice to help guide your thoughts is a great…
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Hello and welcome back to Serum Visions, everyone! This week we shall be looking into a specific style of beer: stout. I plan on making one in the very near future and so I have been reading up on the process, which is a great opportunity to share some of my learnings with you here….
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Welcome back, podders and speculators and financiers all! My last two articles got much less response than normal, probably due to the fact that I strayed from what I consider myself skilled in. I’ll stick to teaching you guys how to make money, and not actually playing the game. Now, let’s get right into a…
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This is part three of my Inventory Management series. Two weeks ago, I led with an introduction talking about the purpose of inventory as well as some common mistakes. In short, inventory is there to support your sales which is how you make money. Last week, I talked about tracking your inventory and calculating your…
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“In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.” –Thomas Jefferson Never give up your personal preference, but being aware of your Magic: The Gathering play style is important. This is what Thomas Jefferson was trying to say, obviously. Everybody has a preferred style when playing, deck building,…
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Q. What do the following have in common? A shoe box full of Ice Age and Revised. Leavings from opened booster boxes going back three years. Smatterings of cards sporting bizarre expansion symbols. A melting pot of pre-constructed products. A. These are typical components of a collection belonging to the “casual magic player.” Aside from…
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[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD7PPPlJC8S-6BJ3dFbse9yJ&w=640&h=360] Today’s Lesson The third installment of Forced Fruition takes us on a journey of discovery and trying to slow roll our way to victory. In this BNG-THS-THS draft, a theme of slowly draining our opponent quickly develops out of pack one. We employ some drafting strategy to fill out the rest of our…
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Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the Puzzle Box! It’s the end of the month, and that means that we are going to review the Puzzle Box list and make sure it is within a couple dollars of our $200 mark. There are a few changes to be made but we’ll discuss those later. First,…
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Last week, I started my Inventory Management series by discussing some basic concepts and common mistakes. Today we’re going to get down into the weeds—we’ll start with tracking and then briefly touch on some metrics you can use to evaluate your performance. I’ll talk more about metrics in my next article, but accurately tracking your…
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Hello, fellow speculators! After the biggest Constructed grand prix ever, GP Richmond, we’ve been a whole lot of winding down from card spikes. The market seems to be returning to the regular world of value investing. It sure has quieted down around here in the MTG finance world. But the slower pace really gives us…
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Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. -Thomas A. Edison I’m going to take a bit of a break this week and shift into getting L.U.C.K.y while playing the game. In a game such as Magic, where there are sixty randomized cards built from thousands of…
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“Well that was fast,” is something I’ve never heard before. Vidianto Wijaya, on the other hand, likely heard that exact phrase entirely too frequently in the last few days. Vidianto ran Red-White Burn this weekend to a fourth-place finish. The burn list is a pseudo-budget list, as most burn lists tend to be, but is also…
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A few weeks ago, I won a PTQ in Dothan, Alabama, playing B/W Midrange. I owe a huge thanks to the tournament organizer and store owner of Fanatix, Phillip Chalker, for hosting one of the best-run PTQs I’ve ever participated in. Also, thanks to Brainstorm Brewery and Danny Brown for giving me the opportunity to…
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Hello, everyone, and welcome back to Serum Visions! This week is the recovery week from poutine and the four-liter pitchers of beer than can be found in lovely Montreal. One of Canada’s most famous breweries can be found around a half-hour drive from the city in a town called Chambly. The brewery is called Unibroue,…
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Today I want to talk about inventory management. Others here at Brainstorm Brewery have touched on this subject, but I don’t feel like it’s been explored in enough depth. I think inventory management is a glaring weakness for many financiers, so much so that I am going to dedicate a series of articles to it….
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This normally isn’t my thing, but I figure that making some outlandish predictions about the future is something I’m occasionally good at, so I’m giving it a try. After GP Richmond’s massive 4,300-person attendance, it’s clear that Modern is really a force in the market. I think that Wizards will continue to show a lot…
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