On the surface this announcement seemed great. Wizards of the Coast announced the rarest card in the history of Magic the Gathering yesterday. There will be a single printing of a “The One Ring” variant from the upcoming Lord of the Rings set. It will be a serialized 1 of 1 card. Instantly it’s reminiscent of Willy Wonk and the Chocolate factory. Much like playing the lotto you can fantasize about what you would do if you found the golden ticket or “hit that jackpot”.
Your odds of winning the Mega Millions lottery jackpot is 1 in 302,000,000. It’ll cost you two dollars to enter and you will know when the drawing is. Some of the money goes to schools or parks. You also control your fate slightly as you get to pick your numbers if you’d like so you can avoid unlikely number combinations. So what are your odds of finding WotC’s golden ticket? Most likely zero.
Zero. If you look at 1 as a percentage of 302 million. It’s 0(zero). Correct, there won’t be 302 million collector’s packs printed. But that isn’t the problem. You don’t need the number to be 302 million for your odds to be zero. Anything over 100 and your odds are essentially zero(with some numbers after the decimal point). There will undoubtedly be more than 100 collectors packs just in your LGS.
There are too many other variables. What if it sits on someone's shelf who is unopened as an investment? What if it’s accidentally destroyed in a shop fire or a shipping accident? What if someone buys the pack and the post office loses it? The hypothetical ways for this card to get lost or destroyed are endless. Has WotC considered this? Are they going to control where this card ends up? Would we know if they did play a hand in it?
You’re free to play the lottery if you’d like. It’s just better to know your odds if you do. Instead of telling you you’re not going to find this card… or that your odds are zero. WotC instead shared a chart showing you which products you could potentially find it in. You are not going to find this card. WotC is not going to donate part of the proceeds to parks or schools. You have zero control over what you open for $40 a pack!
In our opinion, you are better off playing the actual lottery. Or… buying Dick Tokens. At least with us you know what you will get in every pack(dick).