A new lawsuit filed by shareholders of Hasbro against the company and its directors alleges that company leadership has mismanaged Magic: The Gathering by overprinting sets of cards, thereby devaluing existing ones. It also, quite notably, claims that Hasbro leadership “concealed the true reason” that its widely-criticized, incredibly expensive Magic: The Gathering 30th Anniversary Set was pulled from sale within an hour of its initial release.
The lawsuit, filed in Rhode Island earlier this week, is filed by shareholders Joseph Crocono and Ultan McGlone against Hasbro CEO Christian Cocks, a number of fellow company directors, and Hasbro itself. The lawsuit alleges breaches of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, waste of corporate assets, gross mismanagement, abuse of control, and violations of the Exchange Act.
Specifically, the shareholder plaintiffs claim that, under Cocks’ leadership, Hasbro has been printing far too many Magic: The Gathering sets, thereby reducing the value of existing sets. This complaint probably sounds familiar to avid Magic players, as Wizards of the Coast has been printing significantly more sets per year than it used to. This handy chart made in 2022 by jacobwillson2727 at Only on Tuesdays helps illustrate the problem, and it’s only gotten worse in the years since:
I wonder if the people suing have ever even played the game
I have been playing the game for 26 years now and oh boy has it been flooded with shit the last couple of years. Never thought to see something helpful from shareholders though. Sue them all.
23 years here. Tolarian Community College has a great video on how the new rotation and increased standard legal products have functionality defeated any of the guide rails standard originally had while also massively bloating the pool of cards.
If these investors are moving cards at all they’re well aware of the impact that’s going to have o. The secondary markets. If they’re looking at the movement of sealed products too, they should be lighting torches. Increase in production of creative material always leads to drop in quality which means fewer good cards, mechanics, more bans as poorly conceived cards slip through, and burnout among creative staff. None of which will bode well for anything outside of eternal formats.
Unfortunately, all of this is moot. The current dingus in charge is former EA. Can’t imagine they’re thinking about the weekly putout of the goose, they’ve already sold the golden eggs they think it carries.
I agree that the game is just, well, shit now but the people suing aren’t doing it for the right intentions and I don’t see it improving the game. But seriously, the UB sets killed the game for me, what the holy fuck.
It sounds like they’re scalping.
If… you count just the "Booster product"s though, which are largely the only ones that matter for this allegation, it hasnt gone up much at all. They have been printing ~6 booster sets per year for like the past 10 years
They have been adding other stuff like commander packs, digital releases (which have ZERO bearing on stuff), secret lairs, etc
But those are totally separate products that have zero impact on the “core” rotation of cards and value of them tbh
Theyre counting a Secret Lair drop of five cards that are just alt art as the same as an entire new set which is stupid
There’s been 93 Secret Lairs so far.
