What's that, you say? A Magic Game available to me 24 hours a day? Sign me up! I don't care if I gotta pay a monthly fee; shucks, I don't even care if I gotta start my collection over and shell out cash for boosters (sort of).

That's the big stink nowadays: Buying boosters in Magic Online. Yeah, the thought of that does kind of suck. However, I have an idea that could possibly lighten the load a little....

The Common Pool
This idea came to me as I was thinking about the mechanics of the Magic Online game itself. It would seem to me that I would never need more than four copies of each card printed... Err, digitized. Magic Online would store the decks I have created in its memory. When I want to play a certain deck I have constructed, I give the command and the game fetches those cards from my virtual binder and assembles the deck at Instant speed (I find I am using Magic euphemisms too often...scary). Then, when I want to play another deck, the game swaps the cards I need out in milliseconds. The only reason to have more than four copies of each card in real life constructed is for the sake of convenience. I'm sure we all get sick of swapping cards from deck to deck; Magic Online solves this problem.

So...I get a wild hair and buy a hundred online booster packs (and pray I didn't just spend $350.00 to do so). What can I do with the thirty-two copies of Counterspell and Primal Frenzy that I don't need, now that I have four copies of each of them? I could trade them out to people for other commons... But to me, that seems boring and time consuming. Save the trading for the rares!

How about this: Have an Online Common Pool. Players could turn in their extra commons for a greater reward. For example, for every thirty commons I donate to the pool, I get one free booster pack. This provides a little more incentive to open boosters, since all of the extra commons won't always sit and collect virtual dust. I could then visit the pool anytime I wanted and just take any of the commons I need for free (or for a nickel or some outrageously low price).

It's a great plan: Encourage people to buy packs, since none of the cards will be wasted. Extra commons could be turned in, and unwanted rares could be traded. Also, I can go and get any of the commons I need (that are worthless to the player who turned them in) at will. This will also be beneficial to any of the players who don't purchase the game on its release date. They will have access to some free cards right when they sign up, as other players will have an advantage since they have been collecting online cards for awhile.

What about the Magic community criminals? Couldn't they just pluck out twenty-five commons from the pool and then turn them back in for a free booster? The answer is"No." According to the Magic Online link on the Wizards website, each card has its own virtual number attached to it. Wizards could make it so that each card (or number on each card) could only be turned into the pool once. There you go... Crimestoppers!

Let me know what you all think of this idea (good, bad, pros, cons... Anything at all!) as I am anxious to get some more input on this.

Troy Fisher
tfisher1@insight.rr.com