MTG Gift Pack and Game Night

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Happy Monday MTG peeps,

Some Magic: the Gathering news today posted on the mothersite by Daily MTG content guru, WotC staffer Blake.  The announcement touches upon special 'one - off' products, specifically two separate products both releasing on the same day, 16 November, 2018.  Here are the vital stats before we get into the opinion piece -

Magic Game Night
This is an out-of-the-box introductory multiplayer Magic experience in a way similar to Planeswalker Decks. But for multiplayer.  five preconstructed decks, one of each color, plus all the accessories you'll need to play the decks: spindown life counters, life counter platforms, +1/+1 counters, and five reference cards.  Releasing November 16, Magic Game Night will be available in local game and mass market stores around the world. The MSRP is $39.99 (applies only to the United States and Canada).

Gift Pack
The Gift Pack releases November 16 and will be available in local game stores and mass market stores everywhere. It will have an MSRP of $19.99 (applies to the United States and Canada only).  

The Gift Pack will  contain :
• four Core Set 2019 boosters, 
• five premium lands, 
• a Spindown die, and, for the first time, 
• five creature cards exclusive to the Gift Pack 

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Magic Game Night appears to us a decent offering to friends getting together, and perhaps not wanting to play Cards Against Humanity, Exploding Kittens, Settlers of Catan, etc., how about a Magic: the Gathering, designed for folks who may not have played before.  The brilliant idea here is that everything one may need is in the same box and just sits with the rest of the games for when friends come on over for Game Night.

We have a feeling that there will be two very separate groups of Magic: the Gathering fans receiving this year's 2018 Gift Pack.  The first group are the casuals who will be drawn to the shiny Pokémon-like boxed sets.  In addition to that, Christmas / Holiday gift shoppers in that aisle at Walmart / Target will find this an attractive purchase for their nephews / nieces / kids.  The second group of MTG fans are those which have been playing and collecting for quite a while.  We suspect the majority of this group to issue an agonizing wail and complain that Wizards of the Coast just need to drop a bit more swag into the previous iterations of this Holiday Gift Pack where a big draw was an attractive storage box.  We need more such storage boxes, so do not ask our opinion as we would be biased in our response.

Anywhoos, great arts as per usual in the Gift Pack - do check 'em out -

Angelic Guardian, illustrated by Sara Winters
Angler Turtle, illustrated by Alex Konstad
Vengeant Vampire, illustrated by Mitchell Malloy
Immortal Phoenix, illustrated by Daarken
Rampaging Brontodon, illustrated by Lars Grant-West

Plains, illustrated by John Avon
Island, illustrated by Andreas Rocha
Swamp, illustrated by Mike Bierek
Mountain, illustrated by Andreas Rocha
Forest, illustrated by Volkan Baga

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