Will the booster box bubble burst? (How many other games/systems are people playing?)

By jonboyjon1990, in Star Wars: Destiny

So I've seen a ton of evidence here, on reddit and on the facebook groups that, A LOT of people are getting into this game buying 3,4,5 or even 6 boxes etc.

I wonder how sustainable that is, when people realise that there's 3 sets per year - will they continue buying that many boxes per set? That's around $1200 per year.

And I wonder how many other games/systems people are playing alongside Destiny - surely not many people have the time/money to justify say collecting and playing X-Wing/Imperial Assault/Armada/Destiny etc?

So I've seen a ton of evidence here, on reddit and on the facebook groups that, A LOT of people are getting into this game buying 3,4,5 or even 6 boxes etc.

I wonder how sustainable that is, when people realise that there's 3 sets per year - will they continue buying that many boxes per set? That's around $1200 per year.

And I wonder how many other games/systems people are playing alongside Destiny - surely not many people have the time/money to justify say collecting and playing X-Wing/Imperial Assault/Armada/Destiny etc?

I've always said: "Pointing at other people results in three of your own fingers pointing back at yourself".

Go ahead, try it. I'm looking at you Mr. 75 Xwing-Shis-In-His-Signature-Guy.

/wink

Of course we do...of course we do.../seriousYodaYouWillBeLook

Edited by Versch

So I've seen a ton of evidence here, on reddit and on the facebook groups that, A LOT of people are getting into this game buying 3,4,5 or even 6 boxes etc.

I wonder how sustainable that is, when people realise that there's 3 sets per year - will they continue buying that many boxes per set? That's around $1200 per year.

And I wonder how many other games/systems people are playing alongside Destiny - surely not many people have the time/money to justify say collecting and playing X-Wing/Imperial Assault/Armada/Destiny etc?

I've always said: "Pointing at other people results in three of your own fingers pointing back at yourself".

Go ahead, try it. I'm looking at you Mr. 75 Xwing-Shis-In-His-Signature-Guy.

/wink

Of course we do...of course we do.../seriousYodoYouWillBeLook

....OK...

Playing Xwing as well right now. I pre ordered a gravity feed of awakenings and am happy with my pulls. I'll still buy some boosters but I likely won't buy another feed until next wave.

We'll see about the new Xwing wave. I have a wish list for ships but I'm ok there, just watching out for sales.

So, for the time being I feel ok with picking up Destiny, the hype has also grown so much lately with the supply shortage that I bet it's going to be a pretty hot game for a while.

First off, MtG has been doing it for years. SW fanbase is simply larger than MtG. So I dont see this being an issue.

Now as for the multiple gaming issues, that is true, but that has already been discussed about FFG flooding the market alone on SW games. I think XWing and Imperial Assault will be fine. Armada will be niche. Rebellion I dont think will take off much. The main issue is the LCG. Will that hurt that community. I think those that have collected a ton at this pt will still play and those that hate the random/collecting of a CCG will stick with the LCG, but this game is fun and that will trump a lot.

~D

So I've seen a ton of evidence here, on reddit and on the facebook groups that, A LOT of people are getting into this game buying 3,4,5 or even 6 boxes etc.

I wonder how sustainable that is, when people realise that there's 3 sets per year - will they continue buying that many boxes per set? That's around $1200 per year.

And I wonder how many other games/systems people are playing alongside Destiny - surely not many people have the time/money to justify say collecting and playing X-Wing/Imperial Assault/Armada/Destiny etc?

I've always said: "Pointing at other people results in three of your own fingers pointing back at yourself".

Go ahead, try it. I'm looking at you Mr. 75 Xwing-Shis-In-His-Signature-Guy.

/wink

Just to clarify - my OP isn't anything to do with how much people choose to spend on the game or not. And you're obviously saying something along the lines of "you've spent tons on X-Wing so who are you to judge?"

I'm not judging. If you read my OP again, you'll find there's nothing in there about that. I'm simply saying:

Many people are buying 3+ booster boxes - is that sustainable? And what correlation is there between people owning/collecting other games/systems with buying lots of Destiny boxes?

Of course we do...of course we do.../seriousYodaYouWillBeLook

Oh and I've no idea what this means...

Edited by jonboyjon1990

So I've seen a ton of evidence here, on reddit and on the facebook groups that, A LOT of people are getting into this game buying 3,4,5 or even 6 boxes etc.

I wonder how sustainable that is, when people realise that there's 3 sets per year - will they continue buying that many boxes per set? That's around $1200 per year.

And I wonder how many other games/systems people are playing alongside Destiny - surely not many people have the time/money to justify say collecting and playing X-Wing/Imperial Assault/Armada/Destiny etc?

No, people will stop buying that many boxes once the market stabilizes and game shops start cracking packs to sell singles.

Really no way to tell as it really could go any direction. I'd guess it will stay a big seller for a while with people buying a good amount of boxes.

Buying 3 boxes at a time is too much for me but doesn't seem too far from what some competitive players already shill out every wave for IA.

I primarily play tabletop games like Warhammer 40k. $1200/year is practically free.

$1200 a year is...

$100 a month is...

$23ish a week is...

...not a whole lot in the grand scheme of things. Now let's do this backwards. Everyday at work, I buy a coffee in the morning and a tea in the afternoon. I get a total of $1.75 in pocket change from these two transactions.

$1.75 a workday is...

$8.75 a week is...

$37.92 a month is...

$455 a year

Jar money is hobby money. Jar money paid for my 4 starters, 2 full boxes and 20 loose boosters.

I'm betting that most future expansions will have LESS cards than Awakenings... because Awakenings is the core set. 1 or 2 boxes might be all you need in the future.

Personally I'm really interested in splitting a box with a friend and doing a Snake Draft of the content after we've opened all boosters. This way you can focus on maybe enhancing ONE deck first, and worry about filling out your collection afterwards.

If you play competitive MtG... you are shelling out a lot.

My friend plays BuddyFight and he says he spends $300/month on cards. He gets about 6-8 boxes every expansion.

I'm getting 3 boxes and then seeing what I can build from them... chasing the singles I may need.

I'm just speaking for myself, not others, but I went with 2 boxes this time and kind of feel like 2-3 boxes would be about right for the size of the set. I have 2 copies of a several of the rares---a few with 3-4, a few with 0-1, but I don't feel like I have a lot of excess copies. Anything more that that would just be for the extra legendaries or just to get more rares to use for trading purposes. But I kind of feel at this point like I'll just go to the secondary market to fill out the stuff I want. Well, I'll do that once more product is released and supply improves to meet demand better (and hopefully prices come down a bit).

I think I'll stick with the 2 box approach in the future. Maybe one if it's a smaller release.

We'll see what happens with the next release. I could see some speculators buying up even more boxes next time hoping for the same type of pricing bubble initially.

People on average always buy more the first set of any card game, as simply they need enough to play the game. As more sets come out they buy less to get some fun new stuff and shift their focus to the single market to only build the decks they are interested in playing

I'm betting that most future expansions will have LESS cards than Awakenings... because Awakenings is the core set. 1 or 2 boxes might be all you need in the future.

Personally I'm really interested in splitting a box with a friend and doing a Snake Draft of the content after we've opened all boosters. This way you can focus on maybe enhancing ONE deck first, and worry about filling out your collection afterwards.

Stated in interviews each set will have around 160 cards, and about 24 char (3 and 1 non-unique per color and side) and red may have a habbit of getting more then one non-unique as it tends to be more swarmy

They're going to learn sooner or later that bigger sets are better for card design and game balance.

Edited by WonderWAAAGH

Lukas has already stated numerous times that each set is going to be as close to 160 cards as possible. Awakenings should not be considered a core set as it will be no larger than any other set.

6 boxes produces 36 legendaries (for me at least, which is the 1 in 6 pack ratio). And 17 Legendaries x 2 = 34. And to be honest, I almost got that. I'm 5 legendaries away from 2 complete sets. I was fortunate enough that my case balanced out to almost exactly the right amount. I got at least 2 of every rare. All the commons/uncommons. NOW, you could have bought 2 saga sets from Covenant for $600 and got basically the same thing, but I had a lot more fun opening packs AND I have a ton of extra trading material than I would have gotten from the saga sets.

~D

I think I will stick to 2 booster boxes per cycle and trade/singles market anything else I may need. I will however have to battle myself trying to decide to trade or collect lol

Lukas has already stated numerous times that each set is going to be as close to 160 cards as possible. Awakenings should not be considered a core set as it will be no larger than any other set.

Technically if they aim for 160 cards awakenings IS larger than other sets

Well consider this the next cycle won't have starter cards. So they will be about the same as far as boosters go

Buying boosters boxes won't stop as long as the boxes have some kind of incentive. Keeping putting in exactly six Legendaries and they'll keep selling. This model of "hits per box" has worked well for sports cards, trading cards, CCGs, etc. This set also has a nice mix of flashy Legendaries, like Vader, and more mechanical material, like Thermal Detonator to keep collectors and gamers interested.

I think I'll probably just buy the saga set from Team Covenant each release and after playing a bit and figuring out what decks I want to play I can just sell the rares/legendaries/uncommons I don't want and probably make my money back.

People on average always buy more the first set of any card game, as simply they need enough to play the game. As more sets come out they buy less to get some fun new stuff and shift their focus to the single market to only build the decks they are interested in playing

.

I very much agree with this. This is the first set of the game, so everyone is starting from the ground up and needs to build a larger pool of cards. Once you have that pool of cards, there isn't as much of a need (from a gameplay perspective, at least) to get entire playsets of future releases. I got 12 boosters at the prerelease event, and ordered one box for the wide release. After 48 booster packs, I'm only missing 6 uncommons and 10 rares (to have at least one copy of each card). I'm much more inclined to track those down on the singles market than keep gambling with random pulls. With this solid foundation of cards from the first set, I doubt I get a box for the next set. I'll probably get a few packs for fun, or split a box with a friend to draft from it (might be a good way to at least get most of the commons); but instead of tossing $100 at the random crapshoot I'd much rather go on the singles market and just buy the characters and cards that I want most.

The scarcity and issues with the first printing also contributed to higher booster box sales: it's a seller's market for singles, so most folks could buy a booster box and pay for it by selling off a few of their legendary cards. This also meant that you were better off buying booster boxes to try and get the cards you wanted, rather than paying out the nose for overinflated legendary cards on the singles market. When Asmodee first refused to rectify mispacking problems, buying a booster box was the only way to guarantee you didn't get screwed out of your legendary -- indeed, buying a booster box is the only way to guarantee a fair legendary distribution at all. Shortages also encouraged folks to be bolder with their initial orders, as there was no guarantee that additional product would be available soon. Assuming these release hiccups are ironed for the next set -- more product availability up front leads to less buyer anxiety and a thriving singles market; while better quality control/mispacking policies make boxes less necessary to protect yourself -- booster boxes won't be as essential. You can go through the singles market instead, or spread your purchases out to a few loose packs here and there (with no worry that mispacks will screw you over, or product scarcity will make it impossible to get what you want). Furthermore, you simply won't need as many cards in March or April to play the game as you do now. Most folks won't be building a whole Spirit of the Rebellion deck, they'll be using cards from Spirit of the Rebellion to enhance or alter their Awakenings deck.

Edited by sionnach19

Do we have timeframe for the next set release?

@JonJon

I was making light humor about your question of a player sustaining multiple games a year.

But typing has no tone.

So, without humor: For me personally, and any other avid Hobbyist (not common gamer), $1200 per year on a collectible game (Wargame, CCG, and all the neat little alternate game pieces associated with them) is low cost investment. I sustain Armada, imperial Assault, all the Xwing cuz why not (and Aturi Cluster play), and many game scouting purchase efforts.

There are games out in the market that I have tried to just 'see if I would like them' that have at least a $300 buy in. In fact, as a partial example, I spent $100 on Mansions of Madness and after one play KNOW it's not going to hit my table again. Great rules, but the genre doesn't suit me. But I gave it a go (scouting effort).

That's all mang.

Oh and the /YodaYouWillBeYouWillBe...it was my response to your "surely not many people have the time/money to justify say collecting and playing X-Wing/Imperial Assault/Armada/Destiny etc?" Meaning YOU will be sustaining more than Xwing. Light humor again. Que Luke saying "I'm not afraid!" Yoda: "You will be...you WILL be".

0d9bc4a49c4f4fed0c8970ac82b5c2778c8dba2b

Happy gaming!