Boring Numbers on Card Set Ratios

[Sleepy]

So we know that card rarities are a thing, and that they are necessary to keep the game afloat economically, though Yugioh can have some pretty insane card ratios like how Secret Rares are (1:24) plus the fact there's around 8 in each set with different pull ratios so the number to get what you really want can sometimes get as ridiculous as (1:192) and up, especially for playsets.

 

Honestly, I'm not sure this kind of thread belongs into any section of the forums, so I figured this was about the closest thing... Sorry if I made a mistake here.

 

Well anyways... Many of us have at times heard the phrase "a rich man's game", so I have a question.

 

How would you change this situation while still making it profitable enough, if you think this could be improved at all?

 

---

 

[spoiler=Also, I have a hypothetical booster ratio, though numbers may be altered]

Set size: 130

Each pack contains 15 cards (4 Common, 3 Rare, 2 Super Rare, 2 Ultra Rare, 1 Ultimate Rare, 1 Secret Rare, 1 Holographic/Ghost Rare, 1 Starfoil)

 

Each of the 130 cards contains 3 different artworks. 

Each card in the set and its respective alternate artworks is available in any and all rarities.

The Starfoil slot is a wild card. It can be any card with any of the other rarities mentioned but with the Starfoil/DT-like holo on it.

All 130 cards with their respective alternate arts have an equal pull ratio.

[/spoiler]

 

So on this one I ask, how bad or how plausible does something like that look to you?

It of course is talking of "rarities" as in the holo effects of the cards.

The idea is that getting the cards you NEED for a deck is actually pretty easy, but the incentive is getting the cards you WANT, since something like for example "card #112, artwork #2, Secret Rare, playset please" can get as ridiculous as a ~ (1:390) per copy, and that's actually harder to pull than pulling the secret rare you want IRL if the ratios were all equal.

 

This last bit basically depends on how big is the desire for the aspects of cards that do not affect actual gameplay. 

Nothing big, just something that was in my head the other day.

[Zauls]

I think your idea makes it too easy to get high-rarity cards and would mean Konami can't make profit. I honestly think the best method is to just get rid of Secret Rare, or just make Secret Rare ratios the same as Ultra. Ulti and Ghost are fine because they both come in lower rarities in the pack usually, so they can be for collectors/rich players. But when a card is worth any more than £30 as a Secret Rare, its a bit ridiculous.

[Cosmo.]

I feel like that would be a bit exaggerated, making every pack like a mega pack isn't very wise and would take out all the rarity and value each card has (even though they're still expensive), but the best thing that they could do is to increase the pack's size to 15 card, 9 for 5€ is a lot! And also increase a bit the chance of finding a Super Rare, this way, even if you don't find what you were looking for, you still have a nice Super Rare. That i think would actually help them, because it would make buying packs worth it again, because you could have higher chances of finding a card to make profit out of and get a reasonable quality/price comparison

[goodfusion]

I like the idea of being able to get any card in the pack in Starfoil Rare, similar to the Battle Packs. If it was something like 1 in 3 packs to get a Starfoil it would be cool as you would have a relatively high chance of getting something interesting but it would still be very rare to get the cards which are normally Secret Rare as you could get any card in the pack.

Obviously it wouldn't have to be Starfoil Rare, but that was the one used in the OP.

[Sleepy]

I think your idea makes it too easy to get high-rarity cards and would mean Konami can't make profit. I honestly think the best method is to just get rid of Secret Rare, or just make Secret Rare ratios the same as Ultra. Ulti and Ghost are fine because they both come in lower rarities in the pack usually, so they can be for collectors/rich players. But when a card is worth any more than £30 as a Secret Rare, its a bit ridiculous.

 

The idea I posted, just to make sure is clear: All cards can be pulled in all rarities. All cards can be pulled in Secret Rare. All cards can be pulled in commons. "High-rarity cards" are just the holo effects. So you have a 1 out of 130 card ratio of getting it in Secret. 

What I'm saying is, there are not really specific high rarity cards to obtain, just high rarity versions of something you want.

 

Just making sure the idea I posted at the end is not being misunderstood....

 

 

I feel like that would be a bit exaggerated, making every pack like a mega pack isn't very wise and would take out all the rarity and value each card has (even though they're still expensive), but the best thing that they could do is to increase the pack's size to 15 card, 9 for 5€ is a lot! And also increase a bit the chance of finding a Super Rare, this way, even if you don't find what you were looking for, you still have a nice Super Rare. That i think would actually help them, because it would make buying packs worth it again, because you could have higher chances of finding a card to make profit out of and get a reasonable quality/price comparison

 

 

Actually, Konami did increase the pack size during the era they were releasing the Dark Beginning/Dark Revelation series. If I remember correctly it was also the first time ever that pulling a holographic card didn't mean you would get no rare. I think that was a pretty cool concept.

 

In actuality, I think currently we have the most cards per set that we've ever had, considering older 110+ card sets from the TCG were actually compilations from smaller OCG packs, delivered like that in order to catch up to them (even though the work ended up half-assedly staying 3 months behind for years instead aiming for global releases).

And it is sheer set size what probably determines pack size.

 

As an interesting note, OCG gets 5 cards per pack instead of 9 if I remember correctly, and nowadays the sets released are pretty much the same size in number as TCG so I guess it is mostly a remnant, though it'll probably stay that way until whatever, because Konami sometimes takes years to repair something... of course that's IF OCG players aren't cool with it to begin with, and I don't think I've ever heard complains about it so, IDK.

 

If I had to pick a ratio different than the theory pack I posted in the OP, I'd say the one that MTG uses is pretty appealing with 15 cards, 2 rares, and 1 Super Rare, and with a potential 1:8 Ultra (obv. not using MTG rarities but YGO ones in this sentence).

 

Then again, MTG and Pokemon can do those things to both complement and make up for their rotation formats (I realize I'm making a huge jump in reasoning unless I elaborate here, but I think the post is getting about wordy enough so I think I'll do that on another occasion).

[Airride]

Pack composition is something I feel Pokemon has done very right.

You get 1 Rare, 3 Uncommon, 5 Common, and 1 Reverse Foil.

The rare has a 1/3 chance of being a Holofoil, and an (estimated) 1/10 chance of being an Ultra Rare, and a 1/35 (rough estimation, again) of being a Super rare (Fullart EX or Supporters), and an unknown chance of being a Secret Rare (Unknown ratio, estimated 1 or 2 per case of boxes).

Now, this may seem similar to what YGO does, but there's 1 main difference; The Uncommon cards that are also included. Well, and the relative commonness of Holofoil cards, but I digress.

In YGO pack terms, this roughly translates to:

 

5:1 Common

2:1 Rare

2:3 Super rare

1:3 Ultra rare

1:10 Secret Rare

1:24 Ultimate rare

1:216 Ghost rare

 

Seems pretty ridiculous with how our Card ratios are set up now, huh? Changing it a bit, to be more like 1:5 Ultra rare, 1:12 Secret Rare, and perhaps 1:2 Super rare, with all of those replacing one of the 2 rares in a pack. (also, 7:1 Commons, and 2:1 rares) That makes it so that each box:

 

>Every Common 3-4 times

>Every rare 2-3 times

>12 Supers

>4-5 Ultra rares

>2 Secret rares

>1 Ultimate Rare

>Chance of Ghost Rare

 

The shift causes the possible following changes:

 

-Rares never become expensive af. I can recall some that are at least $5, which seems ridiculous for the 2nd lowest rarity (then again, stuff like Pokemon catcher was $10, so...)

 

>In an ideal world, you get 1 set of Super rares from 2 boxes and then some. This is a good improvement from the ideal world situation of getting them all from 3 boxes, and makes Super rares quite a bit less expensive and rare. I calculate some ratios for 1:1 and 1:3, and 1:1 made them TOO common, and 1:3 made them about as hard to get a particular one as an ultra with the current ratios, which isn't something that seems good, since you want a particular one to be more common that one in a  higher rarity.

>You get roughly 1/2 of the possible Ultras per box. This, again, makes Ultra rares more accessible, and not a consistent $5+ like now.

>You get 1/4 of the set's Secret rares per box. I still don't like this ratio, as secret rares would still be quite expensive. perhaps an adjustment to 1:10 or 1:9, but this would need to be tested.

>Ultimate rares don't change. They're luxuries, anyway.

>Same with Ghost Rares.

 

As another note, having the "extra" rarity of Starfoil/Mosaic/DT rare/ etc wouldn't be bad, to replace a common. Or soemthing. Dunno.

 

After looking at the current ratios, this basically means putting each rarity down by 1. Meh, whatever.

Also, if doing the 1:1 super idea, increase packs to 10. I think the 9 cards per pack is fine right now, personally, with YGO deck being quite a bit smaller than Magic/Pokemon decks, so less overall cards are needed. (And yes, I'd like Pokemon packs to increase in size, to 2 rares, 4 Uncommon, 8 Common, 1 Reverse Foil)