During the release of Magic: the Gathering‘s last expansion, “Guilds of Ravnica,” game publisher Wizards of the Coast debuted a special edition product known as the “Mythic Edition.” Retailing at $249.99, the set included 16 standard booster packs of “Guilds of Ravnica” alongside eight special boosters that included cards from the new expansion with a twist– each of those eight packs came with a special borderless art promo Planeswalker card from Magic‘s expansive history. Originally touted as an “experiment” by Magic‘s Head Designer Mark Rosewater, it seems that the first trial was deemed successful enough for a second– Magic‘s upcoming “Ravnica Allegiance” expansion will be receiving “Mythic Edition” treatment as well.
During the unveiling and distribution of “Guilds of Ravnica: Mythic Edition,” Wizards of the Coast received criticism on several fronts for the product. Some were against the product in conceit, balking at the limited nature and high price point of the product. Other players responded to that by stating these products were meant for collectors and had no impact on the playability of the game itself. Regardless of where they stood on the conceit, however, customers experienced huge issues actually attempting to purchase the “Mythic Edition” product, as it was only available via two channels. The first was Wizards’ parent company Hasbro’s website, which plagued shoppers with errors when they tried to add the “Mythic Edition” to their carts and did not ship internationally at all. The second distribution channel was secondary market retailer ChannelFireball, who partnered with Wizards to distribute a small number of “Mythic Edition” product at major Magic tournaments that they ran, which was the catch– you had to be able to pick up the product in person in order to purchase it from them.
Despite the issues, however, “Guilds of Ravnica: Mythic Edition” sold out. And it seems Wizards has learned some lessons from the first go around, as they announced some changes for “Ravnica Allegiance: Mythic Edition’s” distribution. Rather than being sold on Hasbro.com’s e-shop, the product will be released on their official Ebay store, which accomplishes two things. First, Ebay has a digital infrastructure that is better equipped to handle the traffic volume past limited edition Magic products have tended to create. Second, selling on Ebay will allow Hasbro to ship “Mythic Edition” product internationally. As such, they will not be partnering with any companies to distribute this product at any future MagicFest tournaments.
“Ravnica Allegiance: Mythic Edition” will go on sale at noon PT (3 p.m. ET/8 p.m. GMT) on Thursday, January 24. It will retail for $249.99 and will feature the same product structure as the previous “Mythic Edition’: sixteen standard boosters of Ravnica Allegiance and eight special ones that feature one of the following Planeswalkers:
- Karn, Scion of Urza
- Tamiyo, the Moon Sage
- Sorin Markov
- Jaya Ballard
- Ajani, Mentor of Heroes
- Dack Fayden
- Domri, Chaos Bringer
- Kaya, Orzhov Usurper
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