$1.99 per pack- there are micro-transaction purchase-only cards you have to farm from paid "premium packs"

[crumb]

---Update on pricing: One premium booster of 10 premium cards costs $1.99.---

For starters, much to the chagrin of everybody that's going to play Duels 2015, there are Premium Booster packs, only purchasable as microtransactions. These boosters host a completely separate set of cards for your collection, so if you want to acquire every card in the game, you'll be forced to farm rewards and pay cash.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/conferences/e32014/11700-Magic-2015-Duels-of-the-Planeswalkers-Deck-Building-Hands-On

Some of the confirmed pay only cards:

Stoneforge Mystic, Kitesail Apprentice, Cloudshift, Wall of Omens, Squadron Hawk, Arrest, Paragon of New Dawns

Vapor Snag, Think Twice, Pestermite, Phantasmal Dragon, Talrand, Sky Summoner, Coral Barrier, Paragon of Gathering Mists, Soul of Ravnica

Vicious Hunger, Pharika's Chosen, Liliana's Specter, Dead Reckoning, Phyrexian Rager, Graveborn Muse, Paragon of Open Graves

Burning Inquiry, Goblin Bushwhacker, Goblin Shortcutter, Seismic Strike, Skullcrack, Warstorm Surge, Paragon of Fierce Defiance

Young Wolf, Gather Courage, Aura Gnarlid, Mold Shambler, Garruk's Packleader, Doubling Season, Paragon of Eternal Wilds

Maelstrom Archangel

Darksteel Axe, Millstone, Blasting Station, Galvanic Juggernaut, Darksteel Ingot, Hall of Triumph, Kozilek, Butcher of Truth

These are not included in the "complete edition" and are luck based.

The plane of alara is also completed and will either be additional day 1 DLC (not included in complete edition) or released very shortly after launch, current known card list for alara:

Akrasan Squire
Knight of the Skyward Eye
Asha's Favor
Sanctum Gargoyle
Etherium Sculptor
Courier's Capsule
Brackwater Elemental
Traumatic Visions
Blister Beetle
Glaze Fiend
Drag Down
Viscera Dragger
Maniacal Rage
Resounding Thunder
Wandering Goblins
Thorn-Thrash Viashino
Wild Nacatl
Matca Rioters

Sigiled Paladin
Esperzoa
Scavenger Drake
Hellspark Elemental
Arcane Sanctum
Crumbling Necropolis
Jungle Shrine
Savage Lands
Seaside Citadel

Battlegrace Angel
Sharding Sphinx
Death Baron
Banefire

Rafiq of the Many
Kresh the Bloodbraided

[Marwan]

Thanks for the info, that pretty much hits the last nail on this coffin. No thanks, WotC, this is taking it too far, I'll pass on this one.

[Eilanzer]

For starters, much to the chagrin of everybody that's going to play Duels 2015, there are Premium Booster packs, only purchasable as microtransactions. These boosters host a completely separate set of cards for your collection, so if you want to acquire every card in the game, you'll be forced to farm rewards and pay cash. Wizards knew that premium boosters would likely aggravate a decent portion of the playerbase, so there are safeguards to keep it from being too much of a pay-to-win scenario. Your collection is limited to four of any common, three of any uncommon, two of each rare, and one of each mythic. This will keep players from just buying a hundred boosters and building the uber-competitive super-decks that you'll see at the tournament level of competitive play. It's a welcome restriction for players like myself, that tend to avoid microtransactions.

Yeah but you just need ONE uber broken "premium" card (with just a lil tutor to find) in a deck to eat the peasants alive ¬¬

[ein]

While power through micropayments is generally frowned upon around here, and not a good or fair practice I like to see spreading around the gaming world... use your head, man. This is Magic. We've been buying booster packs to improve our decks for the better part of twenty years.

Removing the pay2win element was a cute way to make a campaign-based game which served as a tutorial and easy entry, but we've got four of those games now. Enough already.

Magic is not a freemium game. It's not a single purchase experience you buy into and play forever. MtG is and always has been by its nature an expensive hobby. You don't "pay to win," you pay to participate at all. You pay a lot to participate. That is the nature of the beast, and everything else we've seen here up till now is just marketing.

It's about time we had a full service MtG client that doesn't look like Yahoo Parcheesi '97. Give me a nice looking Planeswalkers game with everything Magic has to offer including the cost. I've got more free and fair games than I can swing a cat at. We don't need a Magic that everyone can play and everyone can win. Give us a Magic that's true to its roots and contains the whole damned experience.

[sepul12000]

^ is that not mtg:online?

[Ham the Terrible]

I would not mind this so much if cards carried over to the next year and they didn't remove some of the old game modes to make it easier for them to add these boosters and keep balance. But as it is, I'm betting when 2016 is released, all your booster cards you paid for will be unusable in the next game.

[slowpoke]

Originally posted by sepul12000:

^ is that not mtg:online?

MTGO is the "looks like yahoo parcheesi '97" he mentioned. the game's interface is absolutely abysmal and takes all the fun out of playing the game

[Marwan]

Originally posted by Ham the Terrible:

I would not mind this so much if cards carried over to the next year and they didn't remove some of the old game modes to make it easier for them to add these boosters and keep balance. But as it is, I'm betting when 2016 is released, all your booster cards you paid for will be unusable in the next game.

I totally agree. I'm also a bit put off that after buying the game I'm expected to shell out more to purchase better cards to now play the game. I'm ending up paying more for digital cards that I don't even own compared to buying the physical cards which I can say are mine.

I wouldn't mind if, aside from a starter deck, digital boosters were microtransaction only as long as a) my cards carry over from yearly planeswalker game to game and b) the client/game is free. I guess I pretty much am asking for mtgo with the prettier, smooth running planeswalker interface.

[ein]

Totally agree with you guys about resetting the game every year. Buying an "expansion pack" or two for a perennial game with a new campaign every time is one thing. If we're going to buy cards for competitive play we have to be able to keep the cards and use them forever.

But these people have now had four chances now to do right by their customers, and frankly it's clear that they simply don't get it.

[Τhe Rolling Cheese Wheel]

Yay barely any game improvements but wants more money, typical Wotc.

[WarPigeon]

Originally posted by ein:

While power through micropayments is generally frowned upon around here, and not a good or fair practice I like to see spreading around the gaming world... use your head, man. This is Magic. We've been buying booster packs to improve our decks for the better part of twenty years.

Removing the pay2win element was a cute way to make a campaign-based game which served as a tutorial and easy entry, but we've got four of those games now. Enough already.

Magic is not a freemium game. It's not a single purchase experience you buy into and play forever. MtG is and always has been by its nature an expensive hobby. You don't "pay to win," you pay to participate at all. You pay a lot to participate. That is the nature of the beast, and everything else we've seen here up till now is just marketing.

It's about time we had a full service MtG client that doesn't look like Yahoo Parcheesi '97. Give me a nice looking Planeswalkers game with everything Magic has to offer including the cost. I've got more free and fair games than I can swing a cat at. We don't need a Magic that everyone can play and everyone can win. Give us a Magic that's true to its roots and contains the whole damned experience.

Just because "it's always been that way" doesn't mean it still has to be. Regardless as to what collecting decks for Magic is like in real life, there are plenty of card game video games that don't require to you make separate purchases to get all the cards.

[Justicar]

Originally posted by ein:

While power through micropayments is generally frowned upon around here, and not a good or fair practice I like to see spreading around the gaming world... use your head, man. This is Magic. We've been buying booster packs to improve our decks for the better part of twenty years.

Removing the pay2win element was a cute way to make a campaign-based game which served as a tutorial and easy entry, but we've got four of those games now. Enough already.

Magic is not a freemium game. It's not a single purchase experience you buy into and play forever. MtG is and always has been by its nature an expensive hobby. You don't "pay to win," you pay to participate at all. You pay a lot to participate. That is the nature of the beast, and everything else we've seen here up till now is just marketing.

It's about time we had a full service MtG client that doesn't look like Yahoo Parcheesi '97. Give me a nice looking Planeswalkers game with everything Magic has to offer including the cost. I've got more free and fair games than I can swing a cat at. We don't need a Magic that everyone can play and everyone can win. Give us a Magic that's true to its roots and contains the whole damned experience.

And that's why I play this now rather than physical MtG. But I'll make a compromise. I'll buy a few reasonably priced boosters. If they put the damn special modes back in. Don't strip down the game even further, then expect me to sink more cash into it than the previous games.

[ein]

Originally posted by WarPigeon:

Just because "it's always been that way" doesn't mean it still has to be.

Of course it doesn't, but the alterntive is something we already have. Many times over.

Regardless as to what collecting decks for Magic is like in real life, there are plenty of card game video games that don't require to you make separate purchases to get all the cards.

That's awesome. I prefer the myself. Again, why do we need more of these? Why do we need a game with a long history of card acquisition and a long history of being expensive to suddenly take a seat in a folding chair alongside all these other games? We can honestly do without another of those.

The sensible compromise seems kind of obvious in this case. Free or cheap casual play with access to every card ever, so that anyyone who wants to play for fun or just get their feet wet can do so at their pleasure. Organized matches, rankings, restrictions, and every other perk associated with owning the cards and showing up in person - all go behind the paywall.

[Diogenes]

Well, after playing several Magic games over the last few months, I think that I'll pass on this one.

It seems ike a combination of Might and Magic: Duel of Champions, and Magic 2014: Duel of Planeswalkers and takes inspiration from the worst element's of each game.

A couple of thing's put me off:

1: MTS. I've seen the MTS on Might and Magic: Duel of Champions having invested quite some time in it, and I hate how the A.I is allowed to use customized, open decks against starter decks. I've never supported that, and it's not as if the A.I doesn't have enough going for it as it is. MTS in general, are usually an instant dislike in most games that have them, especially when the MTS is used to obtain cards that can only be bought via the MTS. It can take only a single OP card to completely ♥♥♥♥ up any game plan that you have, and then, that will be the end of that, and the A.I is almost guaranteed to have access to that 1 card. Put those two issues together and it makes the game feel like it's almost Pay to Play/Pay to Win.

and

2: The insane capabilities of the A.I, who always have the exact card that they need, as and when they need it. They are capable of defeating any strategy that you lay down with almost perfect play and, almost, never make a mistake. That's been the trend now, for almost every "Might and Magic" game since like, what, Mandate of Heaven? Which was probably the last "Might and Magic" game that I completely, and whole heartedly enjoyed. It's no wonder people only really play against each other online, it's the only way that they can really learn and have a decent game. The game isn't exactly what you call newbie friendly, once you've got the tutorial out of the way with. I mean, the tutorial takes everything into consideration except the perfect play style of the A.I, which makes you wonder if your doing something wrong and that you don't have a good enough deck, or if the A.I is programmed to cheat.

With that all taken into consideration, I have to say that, I'm out and I feel that, if, ubisoft carry on going down the route that they are going down, that they are going to destroy what could be an excellent franchise, in the Might and Magic franchise. It's honestly no wonder that lots of people are leaving each Might and Magic game lately. Ubi are killing it's own game for financial gain.

[Justicar]

Originally posted by Cadderley:

Well, after playing several Magic games over the last few months, I think that I'll pass on this one.

It seems ike a combination of Might and Magic: Duel of Champions, and Magic 2014: Duel of Planeswalkers and takes inspiration from the worst element's of each game.

A couple of thing's put me off:

1: MTS. I've seen the MTS on Might and Magic: Duel of Champions having invested quite some time in it, and I hate how the A.I is allowed to use customized, open decks against starter decks. I've never supported that, and it's not as if the A.I doesn't have enough going for it as it is. MTS in general, are usually an instant dislike in most games that have them, especially when the MTS is used to obtain cards that can only be bought via the MTS. It can take only a single OP card to completely ♥♥♥♥ up any game plan that you have, and then, that will be the end of that, and the A.I is almost guaranteed to have access to that 1 card. Put those two issues together and it makes the game feel like it's almost Pay to Play/Pay to Win.

and

2: The insane capabilities of the A.I, who always have the exact card that they need, as and when they need it. They are capable of defeating any strategy that you lay down with almost perfect play and, almost, never make a mistake. That's been the trend now, for almost every "Might and Magic" game since like, what, Mandate of Heaven? Which was probably the last "Might and Magic" game that I completely, and whole heartedly enjoyed. It's no wonder people only really play against each other online, it's the only way that they can really learn and have a decent game. The game isn't exactly what you call newbie friendly, once you've got the tutorial out of the way with. I mean, the tutorial takes everything into consideration except the perfect play style of the A.I, which makes you wonder if your doing something wrong and that you don't have a good enough deck, or if the A.I is programmed to cheat.

With that all taken into consideration, I have to say that, I'm out and I feel that, if, ubisoft carry on going down the route that they are going down, that they are going to destroy what could be an excellent franchise, in the Might and Magic franchise. It's honestly no wonder that lots of people are leaving each Might and Magic game lately. Ubi are killing it's own game for financial gain.

Sir I think you are confused.

[Mr wyrmwood]

I've got to say I would of prefered if they just updated Magic Online to the same standard's as DotP and let everyone who's already bought cards for it transfer over.

That or make a game with all the card's for full price (say £30) and make you earn them in game.

I own several of the Yu-Gi-Oh game's on DS and the most recent one had over 5000 cards available in game, you just bought booster packs with in-game currency.

Never-the-less I've been enjoying the DotP games a lot lately so I'll buy anyway. I just can't see me paying out for loads of boosters even if that means I won't be truly competative. Guess I can blame that when I lose;)

Anyone know how much the boosters cost by the way? The one's for Magic Online are basicly the same as RL but surely they can't charge that much for this when the games only £6.99