My Predictions for Magic in 2027

 So a good amount (most?) of what's coming for Magic in 2027 has been announced. I think the Universes Beyond sets still haven't been announced, but we have the dates for when they're coming. The biggest announcement (in my opinion) so far has been to how boosters will be packed, with guaranteed foil slots in regular boosters going away, three cards being removed from all collector boosters, and the (re)introduction of "god" packs into both regular boosters and collectors. They also made sure to tell people there would not be a price increase with the booster changes. Which leads me to my first prediction...

Price increase. They've done as much shrinkflation as they can without risking significant consumer backlash. I think the first permanent increase we'll see will be with secret lairs, with the cost per an individual lair going up by $5 each (maybe $10 if Hasbro really wants to test the limits). Secret Lair easily offers the best profit margins of any product they print and a price increase there will go a big way in offsetting increased costs elsewhere while also being able to report to shareholders a higher profit (which is the most important part).

My second prediction also involves secret lair and that's that they'll offer more 24-hour window lairs. I know some people think all secret lairs should be done this way (and I don't disagree), but with printers already being at capacity, that's really not feasible. However, doing so once a quarter or so, for products like commander precons, should still be doable. 

Third will be an price increase to boosters, but I don't think that'll happen til towards the end of the year and likely won't take effect until 2028. In fact having the increase happen with the universes beyond boosters catching up to the booster changes makes perfect sense to make it happen. I imagine the change will equate to an increase of $0.50 per regular packs (assuming the booster box can be bought for MSRP) and $3 to $7 per collector pack at the MSRP level, but it'll still be a market in which MSRP is almost impossible to find for collector product and everyone wanting collector packs will still be paying super inflated (and not worth it) prices.

The one shrinkflation thing I could plausibly see happening, but I don't think it's likely, is the removal of basic lands from commander precons (except the secret lair ones). This however would require two sets of printings of the precons, one for game stores and one for box stores. The box store versions would still have the basic lands, but the LGS ones would instead give you an option of getting a (free) land pack from the store or just using your own lands at home - which most players have way too many of already. And that would be part of their reasoning, they know most players have a ton of extra lands laying around and this is a way they can keep from increasing costs for a little while longer. Again, I don't think this is likely, but my jaw also wouldn't hit the floor if they announced such a thing.

Anyways, the first three are my big predictions, which I'm usually wrong about. I'm not so confident in them I'd place a bet on them happening, but I am confident enough to post them on the internet in case I get the chance to later "I told you so!"

Song of the Day 

Maybe I Should Make My Future Home Office a Padded Room

I have this habit of thinking about things that are weeks (or months) away, but are very important things, and getting very anxious about them. But instead of doing anything about them, I just let myself be paralyzed by fear as to how I'm going to handle them. 

For instance, in my historiography class, the big semester project is a twelve page paper due at the end of the semester. But before the paper is turned in, we have to submit a proposal for our topic, and then a sources list, and then the rough draft. All these items are worth part of the grade. The proposal was due a week and a half ago and I still haven't turned it in. I didn't even notice it was due until like two days before when looking at the syllabus. Normally the instructor keeps us up to date one when things are due, but she's also been really sick lately so maybe it's slipped her mind as well. I have no idea, she hasn't said anything.  

The paper is supposed to be about some big historiogrpahical controversy or a notable historian. I'm hoping to do the former and dive into holocaust denial as I find it absolutely fascinating there's people that try to write history papers claiming the holocaust never happened. But this is beside the point. The point is I'm freaking out. 

Aside from being a bit behind on it already (though in no way so far behind I can't catch up), I have no idea where I'm going to get the time for reading all I need to read for it. As it is, I'm struggling to keep up with the assigned reading for our weekly discussion boards. This week it's 120 pages, which I know isn't that much. But I'm a slow reader. Mostly because I have to reread almost every other paragraph as it's nearly impossible for me to keep focus without my mind wandering off and suddenly I'm turning a page but can't remember what the last half of the page I'm on said.  

I don't know why I suck so much at this school stuff. I know I'm no genius, but I've met people with the same degree I'm going for that are just plain idiots. I feel like if they can do it, almost anyone should be able to. Also, I have no idea how a lot of them did it. I know these days a lot of people use AI and I'm sure I could if I bothered to learn it properly, but that feels like cheating. Particularly because I really do want to learn about a lot of the stuff I'm going over in class. But back to the point, I really don't know how people did it ten-plus years ago. I really suspect a lot of professors only skim papers and so much as you did the minimum requirements, you're good to go whether or not your paper made a good argument. And honestly, that makes sense to me, if I were a professor, that's exactly what I would do. 

Anyways, I need to go to bed so I can get up in a little bit and go to a math class I feel completely lost in, but I'm still keeping my head above water in. 

Song of the Day 

Might Just See the Sunrise Again

I currently work swing shift (3 pm  - 11 pm). My boss wants to move me back to day shift (7 am - 3 pm). In his opinion, Senior NCOs shouldn't be working off-shifts. And while I don't necessarily agree with him, I do understand where he's coming from. But I'm still very torn on whether or not I want to try and fight the move. Fortunately, my boss won't be back to work until Nov. 15, so I've got some time to come up with some good reasoning if I want to fight the move.

Working swings, I get shift differential pay, which comes out to nearly $600 a month. That's no small change. Granted, due to piss poor money management skills, I have no idea what I'm doing with that money, but I'm also sure I could take the loss and be relatively just fine. Honestly, while the shift differential is nice, it's not the main reason I want to stay on swings. 

I mainly want to stay on swings because that's the shift that works best for my natural sleep rhythm. If I had no time commitments in my life, I'm quite sure my natural sleep cycle would be like 2 am - 10 am. That's just where I feel comfortable and refreshed at and my current work shift almost fits that perfectly. 

The other reasons I want to stay swings are way less traffic to deal with (especially coming home from work), much more convenient for medical appointments without having to use up sick leave, and I feel like I get to see a bit more daylight during Alaska winters (which we're coming upon). Oh, also helps out for big Magic releases that happen in the middle of the day, but if I'm ever to start managing my money better, those releases are just gonna have to start being skipped anyways. 

All that said, I've been beginning to think maybe day shift wouldn't be a bad idea for me these days. Granted I would at least want to wait until the semester is over so I don't have to leave work in the middle of the day and then drive back - and I especially don't want to go to class in uniform. But I've definitely been missing out on a lot of social life being on swings so long. Or at least a chance at a social life. And I'm definitely lying to myself when I keep saying I can make swing shift work for a social life, I just need to re-find that groove I had ten years ago. I'm just not built like that anymore; if I'm on swings, I'm not going to bed right away when I get home and I'm not making the effort to get up any earlier than I have to. 

Wow, just writing this I kind of realize I need to go back to day shift. I'm sure I'll hate it at first, but I already hate my job overall, so what's a little more hate on top of that. I probably won't be able to bring Hamlet with me to work either (I bring my dog to work most days since there's not that many people around so there's less likely anyone will complain about it), but I'll find a way to make it up to him. 

Gonna miss that "extra" $600 a month though. Might just have to start selling feet pics online to make up for it. 

Song of the Day 

I lied a little bit

 

I decided to do a little decorating for Halloween. Not a lot, but at least something to help the house feel a little more lived in. So far it doesn't seem to help much, but it doesn't seem to hurt either. And now that the decorations are up, they're going to stay up. Until Halloween. November 1st it all comes down and then it's bare walls again, at least until Christmas (unless I decide to go all bah humbug again this year).

I want to be more excited about coming home. I want to feel like I can call this place home. But the only excitement this place holds for me is that my bed is here. Otherwise I kind of feel like I've been house sitting for a friend that's been gone so long I call the place my own, but deep down I know that isn't true. And really, I want a place that I'm happy to show to people. I know I tend to do my socializing outside my home and I'm far too paranoid to want to have lots of people over weekend after weekend, but hosting the occasional game night (assuming I ever get the friends for it) would be fun. 

On the plus side, I'm not so desperate to avoid my home that I've become one of those guys that spends lots of needless hours at work just to not be at home. Granted, most those guys I know are avoiding their families more than their house itself, but I stand by my claim that at least I'm not one of them. 

Song of the Day 

Tomorrow is more of today

I'm too tired for focus. Got home from work and thought I could nap, but I tossed and turned on a couch that I feel like I always fall asleep on. Gave up on on that and made dinner. Spaghetti, it's been a while since I made spaghetti and I could tell. Still came out better than last week's chili though.Cleaned the kitchen because making spaghetti always makes more of a mess than I think it will. Thankfully didn't spill any sauce on my sweater though, or at least nothing I've noticed so far. 

Watched the latest Great British Bake Off episode. I do not agree with the star baker. Not that I don't think they're a good baker (like I know anything about baking) and I wouldn't be surprised if they go all the way and win the whole thing. But they did not deserve star baker this week. They sent home the right person though. 

I swear one of these days I'm going to do some baking. I just need a month off of work to feel rested enough for taking on the task.

Song of the Day 

Tomorrow a likely repeat of today

 It's UTA weekend. I'm tired. There was no UTA in September and somehow between August and now, I forgot how draining these work weekends are. Like I'm already considering tomorrow just not doing any meal prepping and buying my lunches all week. But financially that would be a horrible decision. Not as horrible as buying a bunch of Magic cards, but at least the cards would give me a false and fleeting sense of happiness. (Actually the probably wouldn't even do that these days, but I like to try and be positive about such things). 

Song of the Day 

It's not delivery, it's depression

 

This is my sad single meal. There's some rice down there, some store brand shredded lettuce, and store brand pre-made pork carnitas meat. I call it my sad-single meal because I only have it when I fail to plan for my dinner properly or my plans fail. 

Tonight, it was the latter. My plan had been to go to a burger place right off base during my lunch. They make good burgers and great milk shakes. It was the milk shake I was really looking forward to, but I knew I'd want food too. However, just a couple hours into my shift, it looked like we were gonna be done early today. So I decided to skip lunch thinking I could just grab the burger and shake on the way home. We did not leave work early and I did not go grab a burger on the way home. Instead I had to go by Fred Meyer and get the stuff for this. It's quick, it's easy, and it goes well with an awkward silence.

It's also the kind of meal that when I finish, I kind of but not fully hate myself for eating. Like there's got to be so many better options, yet out of pure convenience I settled for that one. It's also the kind of meal that tends to get me thinking about mistakes made and wondering where I'd be had I never made them. Or maybe if I'd just made them at a different time.

I know I had a lot of cheap and easy meals back when I was drinking, but I didn't have this one. Pretty sure if I did it would've been my go-to drunk meal (not counting when I just ordered delivery, which was my favorite drinking meal). 

Song of the Day 

Not tragedy or comedy, but simply teenage melodrama

 (Note: The following is a story from my high school years. A cringy story at that. And being that the incidents in this story took place 30 years ago, my memories of them will not be perfect. Not only does age change what we remember, but how we remember. That said, I'm going to do my best to tell this story as it actually happened, all from my point of view of course).

Her name, for the purpose of this story, was Dee and she was instantly the most beautiful girl I'd ever laid eyes upon when I met her my junior year. Immediately, without knowing anything about her but how she looked, I was in love. Literally thought I could die for her if the situation should call for it.  

I don't know how long it took. I don't even remember how I got the nerve to talk to her. But eventually we talked and she gave me her phone number so we could talk more. And talk more we did! I don't think it was daily, but it was pretty close. Sometimes we talked for about fifteen minutes, sometimes for a couple hours. Of course, to this day, I have no idea what we talked about other than one conversation about country music (which she loved and I tried to convince myself I enjoyed because that gave us something to talk about). 

For all the talking we were doing, the relationship was going nowhere beyond friendship. And I told myself I was OK with this. Years of going to religious summer camps where young teens were given advice about adult romance taught me that all the best romantic relationships began as good friendships - I just had to wait. Beyond that, I was almost certain our future together was a sure thing. If she didn't have some sort of crush on me, why would she spend so much time on the phone with me? I was also a little forgiving because I figured it would be hard for her to have feelings for me since she was the preppy cheerleader and I was a goth loner (I was actually more of a nerdy loser, but I liked to imagine I was a goth loner type who could be a preppy jock type if I really wanted to). 

I don't remember if it was late junior year or early my first senior year (either way, I do remember we didn't talk much over summer), but somewhere in that time frame a friend of hers told me I needed to quit calling her. They said she didn't like it and half the time she was just setting the phone down while I talked and then she'd pick it up a few minutes later to see if I was still there (I almost always was). And then whenever her and I were done talking, she'd just call her friends to make fun of me for being pathetic and tell them I was essentially stalking her. I'm not sure what I said to the friend, but I remember thinking there was no way the Dee I knew would be that kind of person and this friend must be jealous for whatever reason. 

That evening I did what any sensible teenage boy would do, I called Dee and asked her if there was any truth to what her friend said. She said no, mostly. It turns out she felt I called too much and she was busy so maybe I could not call so often. I agreed. I'm pretty sure I tried to play it off like I was really busy too and was planning on not calling so much as it was. But as soon as I got off the phone, I was devastated. The girl I was sure I was destined to marry didn't even want to talk to me anymore.

I did cut back how often I called, at least for a bit. Honestly, at this point in my life I'm not sure how much longer she and I continued talking for. I'm pretty sure I wasn't talking to her at all once I started my second senior year of high school. I don't think I was really talking to anyone - I was too embarrassed about not graduating on time to want to even look at anyone. 

Funny how I can remember Dee's entrance into my life like it was some pivotal moment that changed the course of my future, but her exit is a blur of a picture I could care less about making any clearer. Such is life I guess.

I wouldn't be until a few years after all that before I did any real looking back upon that time. I don't think I was even looking back upon that time to replay that whole situation with Dee, I was more or less just trying to analyze how much I thought I'd changed since high school. But that "friendship" did have a notable realization for me. All those conversations, all that time I thought her and I were really getting to know one another, were ninety percent me talking. I let her short replies mean so much more than they really did because in my head, I'd built her into someone she definitely wasn't. I was pining for someone that wasn't real and refusing to see the signs that were right there in front of me. It would not be the last time I made such a mistake either.

Anyways, I tell this story from my past because part of it has some serious relevance to my present. Which I actually do plan on writing about before long, but definitely not tonight - it's past time for bed and I'm actually tired at bed time for once.

Song of the Day