r/mtg • u/Meret123 • 10h ago
Commander / EDH The popularity of recent sets for Commander (source: edhrec)
179
u/General-Zombie5075 10h ago
Wizards is going to be chasing that Final Fantasy high for the rest of Magic's existence.
44
u/ForgotMyAcc 10h ago
Just wait for the UB: Warcraft hit. They'll shellshocked from the revenue.
69
u/swankyfish 9h ago
No way it does as well as FF. FF whales are something else, they make Magic whales look like anchovies.
23
u/CathanRegal 8h ago
I think you underestimate the people who still drop 2 grand on a battle pet in WoW. All they need to do is convince Blizzard to let them put redeemable Warcraft cosmetics codes (old WoW TCG style) in chase packs and they’ll make serious money.
12
u/swankyfish 7h ago
2 grand is a rounding error for a FF superfan. How many WoW fans own millions of dollars of statues? How many WoW fans are dropping six figures on a life size anatomically correct ‘doll’ of Sylvanas?
14
u/MissLeaP 5h ago
A friend of mine literally bought every FF precon twice, once regular to take apart and once collector for his collection, one of them thrice even so he has a collectors version of his favourite character to upgrade. And then proceeded to keep buying booster boxes to complete the whole set as collection without buying any singles 😬
4
u/Totally_Not_A_Panda 3h ago
Totally not me considering buying a second set to break apart while keeping the original 4 together ...
Seriously though, Final Fantasy fans are in a league of their (our) own
6
u/KileiFedaykin 8h ago
I see more WoW stickers on vehicles than I do FF. People have a lot of their identity tied up into the Warcraft property.
4
u/swankyfish 7h ago
That’s a measure of popularity though, now how much whales are spending.
Compare both to something like Spider-Man, which certainly has many times more fans than both properties, and is much more widely known. Yet people aren’t dropping millions of dollars on new product related to Spider-Man in the same way they do FF.
-2
u/KileiFedaykin 7h ago
WoW has it's own convention. I think you're underestimating where the whales are. MMOs are built to attract whales. Entire families plan a vacation to go cosplay as WoW characters. It is a very focused franchise that will only really have to focus on Horde vs Alliance instead of 15 games. I think the fan engagement and money with WoW could easily rival FF.
7
u/FullMetal1985 5h ago
You do realize FF14 has its own convention and shit, right? Granted its every two years but its not just one event its three several months apart. And I dont think wow actually has its own convention, blizzards has one and large chunks are about wow but not just for wow, but I'm willing to admit I may just not know about a wow one. Not saying which game is bigger though cause I can see arguments for both, but pointing out one factor is never going to tell us which would do better as a magic set.
0
u/KileiFedaykin 5h ago
I did forget about the FF con, but honestly, it pales in comparison to Blizzcon which is 90% and 10% other Blizzard properties.
I agree that none of this is going to tell us the whole story of popularity, but I firmly believe that FF's overlap is less that WoW's overlap considering both are western properties pushing western fantasy. WoW whales are equally stupid with their buying decisions. I think there enough common overlap with WoW and MTG that we will see a bigger response than some in this thread believe there will be.
My earlier anecdote about the stickers on cars was just a statement about how people will attach it to their identity and proclaim it to the world which I feel these are the people most likely to partake in both hobbies because they aligned with an IP they are passionate about.
I see the majority of the FF whales being in Asia which WoW has less of an overlap with than it dose with western audiences.
None of this can be summed up with hard data. Hell, even the companies spending millions on researching and developing this relationship are betting on how successful this will be and will be wrong to some degree. lol
-1
u/swankyfish 7h ago
That kind of agrees with my point though. FF whales are spending all that money on new, official merch. WoW fans aren’t.
When we’re talking about which set does better that’s an important distinction.
Also, just on raw numbers of players, the FF MMO has three times the registered users of WoW and four times the daily users.
If I may be so bold, I believe you are looking at things from either a US or EU perspective, but globally WoW simply doesn’t touch FF.
2
6h ago
[deleted]
1
u/swankyfish 6h ago edited 6h ago
Estimated numbers online from multiple sources puts FFXIV at 3 million daily users across all platforms and WoW at 700,000 - 1 million.
EDIT: the FFXIV numbers online are slightly confusing, because there are some places that show only the Steam numbers, you need to check it on all platforms.
2
u/mattyt1483 7h ago
You’re delusional - also you’re numbers are off. WOW has more active users and subscribers.
Be bold all you want - but wow brings in $1b per year for blizzard and FF XIV brings in less than a quarter of that.
It’s a great game - but you’re smelling your own farts thinking ff whales are bigger than wow.
3
u/swankyfish 7h ago edited 6h ago
Feel free to look up the numbers yourself because they are readily available online. I cross checked three different sources.
FF also makes over a billion a year, so not really sure what your point there is.
You’re just being rude an abrasive and there is no need for it.
EDIT: the FFXIV numbers online are slightly confusing, because there are some places that show only the Steam numbers, you need to check it on all platforms.
0
u/Ikeiscurvy 5h ago
Feel free to look up the numbers yourself because they are readily available online. I cross checked three different sources.
If they're so available and prove your point, why not just link them yourself?
This type of shit annoys the piss out of me tbh. I have no dog in this fight, I don't care who has bigger whales. But as soon as you say "look it up yourself" you look like you're making shit up.
→ More replies (0)0
u/FinAdda 7h ago edited 5h ago
Rude going the ad hominem path with delusional remark and involving farts. Nice touch.
1
u/mattyt1483 7h ago
lol a cheeky jab is not an ad hominem attack. Now if I didn’t add anything substantive to my post and just made fun of them and claimed that’s why they were wrong, then sure.
As your professor to explain ad hominem again.
→ More replies (0)-2
u/mattyt1483 8h ago
Doubtful. WoW people are nuts - there are literal wow mafias who have put hits out on people IRL for messing with their gold making bots. Also the $100 mounts that fill every major city.
5
u/swankyfish 7h ago
$100? That’s not a whale. I’m talking about people who preordered pallets of FF just so they could rip a complete set on release day.
1
u/AmazonDruid 6h ago
Damn. as much as I love WoW, and as much as I love Magic, they together in UB will make me love them less. just saying.
That being said, I named my Druid's Grove Warden mount on Total RP3 addon as Vitu-Ghazi
And My Frost DK as Svogthir2
59
u/realskramz 7h ago
Edge of Eterneties was so good, a shame it wasn’t as popular
24
u/goremote 7h ago
Imo part of the problem is that most of the Legends in the set feel underwhelming or uninteresting to build. [[Ragost]], [[Tannuk Steadfast]] and [[Tannuk Ensign]] feel like exceptions that prove the rule. I absolutely loved the set's flavor but just don't jive with any legend enough to build one.
6
u/Life-Noob82 6h ago
I loved this set too. I built [[Sami, Wildcat Captain]], Ragost, and Tannuk, Steadfast Second.
3
u/MissLeaP 5h ago
Yeah this. EoE is awesome but few legendaries actually inspired to build a deck for them.
2
2
u/Phoenixness 5h ago
I know putting more legendaries in the set is a contentious topic, but it's my favourite set so I have to push for it.
[[Biotech Specialist]] would have needed minimal modifications to make a fun lander deck commander
[[Cosmogoyf]] in Jund would have been lit and an alternative to [[Disa the Restless]] as a goyf commander, although the ability might need to better suit, I'm not sure exactly what gives a creature like that the requirements to be in golgari but if exile was really the way, Boros or Naya would have been a fairly interesting 'self exile matters'.
It would have been really cool to give the drix (or just one) a 'warp from command zone' ability, there's also no blue drix and two white drix, but I haven't dove deep enough into the drix to know if blue is a colour that can suit them. Something like [[Timeline Culler]] but worded as any zone might have been fun.
[[Genomorph Imago]] has an extended alt art with a legendary frame, so I think it was close. And it is cool.
[[Mechan Assembler]] probably already exists as another card, but take away the per turn and make it so it doesn't loop itself. Probably not that exciting, but cooler than some legendaries from some other sets.
[[Ouroboroid]] I've actually rule 0 as a commander already, it needs to be 5 MV to feel like it's not completely unstoppable.To add on to this, the "legend before" cards are the multicoloured ones with the less interesting abilities, but I understand why they did this.
2
u/Green_Kumquat 2h ago
I built a [[Syr Vondam, Sunstar Exemplar]] deck based around flickering and combos. Either I keep buffing Vondam and have a huge swinger, or he gets killed and I get to blow stuff up. Only costing WB is a great benefit too. He can be a little evil tho
3
u/Inari-k 4h ago edited 4h ago
I built [[Sami, Wildcat Captain]] and it's so fun one I get my affinity high enough. The double strike gives you an alternative win conditions as you only need to get to 11 power (and as it is an artifact deck, I use lots of equipment) and ine shot an opponent with commander damage
2
u/Sirix_8472 5h ago
The problem for EOE in part, was that it followed FF. Everyone spent HARD on FF and was still broke when EOE came out.
FF needed a longer run to run out it's steam and let people recover financially from the buying frenzy. I think any set that followed FF would have suffered.
1
u/Low_Debt8771 5h ago
Theres almost no legendary creatures in it. I think it has less than like 30 eligible commanders.
2
u/Phoenixness 5h ago
There's actually a similar amount to ECL/ECC which looks to have nearly double, though I imagine a 'return to' set brings a lot more people in that space fantasy
12
u/HeWhoTiddles 10h ago
Did you look at the data for people who made decks ahead of time too? I imagine a lot of people see a commander get spoiled and start brewing right away.
6
u/Meret123 9h ago
It's not my graph.
https://edhrec.com/articles/which-magic-sets-were-actually-successful-for-commander
Doing that would be hard as some sets are previewed much earlier than others(MSH), and leaks happen(TMNT).
39
u/handles_messiah 7h ago
EoE has 15 legendary creatures, MSH has 363. Calling this as a measure of "popularity" is a stretch
4
u/Abyssknight24 6h ago
I counted 18 (spacecrafts can be commanders too) but yeah that is still a huge difference.
2
u/FullMetal1985 5h ago
Not to mention your commander takes one slot. Not wanting to use a commander from a set doesn't mean there arent great cards for the 99 that make the set popular.
9
u/Meret123 10h ago edited 10h ago
https://edhrec.com/articles/which-magic-sets-were-actually-successful-for-commander
- Only considers new commanders, not reprints
- Precon commanders included
- MSH data is from 55 days not 60
9
u/Particular-Ride-7197 7h ago
Maybe this is because a) there are way more legendaries in UB and b) UB cards tend to be part of the power creep way more often than in-universe ones. 💁🏻
2
u/Superbomb-122 49m ago
The second point only really applied to Avatar and Final Fantasy, the rest of the UB sets have frankly been pretty weak
15
u/blamcoboyo 10h ago
It’s interesting that for all the hate UB gets, two UB sets were the most popular, and then the spike in the non-UB sets that follow a UB set.
19
u/BreadAdmirable4054 9h ago
I'd argue it's also proprionate to UB having more named legendary characters as a factor.
1
0
u/Clean_Emotion5797 6h ago
EoE is lower than TDM, with FF sitting in between. I don't really see the spike as a pattern, which I assume you're referring to Lorwyn after Avatar.
UB get hate from the fans not because they don't sell well. In fact, it doing so well and dividing the playerbase is probably one of thr reasons it gets hate. From WotC's pov they're obviously the best thing ever.
-11
u/Duxtrous Sharktocrab 8h ago
This stat is also just for commander which is the normie format.
2
u/FeechofMana 6h ago
Yes, it's data from EDHRec, why wouldn't it be only about Commander?
-3
u/Duxtrous Sharktocrab 6h ago
No shit. I'm just saying it does not tell the entire picture for a sets total performance and popularity. It only uses EDHRec which also has a lot of phantom decks on it from people building decks they never buy. It's not really an accurate stat to track set performance by.
1
u/paumAlho 1h ago
Commander "players" are downvoting you but you're super right. Commander is not Magic and is the reason for all of Magic's problems
2
u/mdog9624 5h ago
Avatar coming in second most popular makes me very happy. Gives me hope for another set
2
1
u/AutoModerator 10h ago
Don't worry, your post has not been deleted!
You're more than welcome to post your Commander (EDH) related content here! Here are some additional resources that may interest you:
- The main Commander-focused subreddit: r/EDH. It's the hotspot when it comes to Commander!
- Some other subreddits that may be of interest to you: r/CompetitiveEDH (bracket 5 only), r/DegenerateEDH (bracket 4 only), r/BudgetBrews, r/PauperEDH, r/jankEDH
- Other sites: EDHREC (aggregate card recommendation and analysis site), CommanderSpellbook (a database of known combos)
- Various Discord servers: the EDH Discord proper, the Competitive EDH Discord, the Commander Staple Discord (former Rules Committee), the Commander Library Discord which provides links to other Discords (regional, Commander-specific, etc... servers)
- For free-to-play community Discords we recommend the Tolarian Community College Discord
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
1
u/GeneralJPenguin 7h ago
This would also imply that quantity of legends doesn’t impact number of decks made since final fantasy and spiderman both have tons but very different outcomes in quantity. It would also seem that universes beyond also doesn’t matter since most are on par with a universes within counterpart.
1
1
1
u/Asilaten 4h ago
Doesn't really tell us a ton. Spider-Man and TMNT are near the bottom despite much larger numbers of new legends because of the large number of common and uncommon, borderline-vanilla low-powered legends that get almost no attention. Foundations is at the bottom because it only had 12 new legends. Final Fantasy had a bunch of build-around and high-powered legends, all of which were new.
Basically, all that matters for this figure is the number of new Commanders in the set that inspire people to want to try something. Doesn't mean the set is good (or not), or that people like (or hate) UB. Legend-heavy sets will tend to be overrepresented; sets with reprints will be underrepresented, and (all things being equal) small sets will have less representation.
1
1
u/imLucki 8h ago
Good set has good popularity! In other news...
3
u/cyskil 7h ago
EoE was a great set but less popular than Aetherdrift according to this chart. Definitely more to see here than just good set good popularity.
1
u/imLucki 7h ago
The more to see is the set before their release, very few people cared or saw value in foundations so they didn't buy it. Went with more money in a revisit to kaladesh plane cause they didn't spend. Follow that with the same idea with FF, people went ape shit for it and well damn now I'm broke and can't buy EoE.
0
u/Rich_Squirrel4819 5h ago
Final fantasy didn't surprise me....the plateau for marvel, bloom, edge did....and the success of strixhaven was higher than expected. Cool set but didn't expect it to double bloom and edge that were super well received.
Goes to show you standard/limited don't always correlate to commander.
I expected edge to have more popularity. This graph almost makes a case that wizards doesn't design all sets for commander....which feels really weird to say....
•
u/AutoModerator 10h ago
Heads up! Your post Flair was changed to "Commander / EDH" based on some keywords found in the title.
If this was not actually a post about Commander / EDH you can change the flair back by clicking on the three dots in the top right corner and click "Change post flair" to (re-)assign another flair that describes your post better.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.