MTG players hit back at Assassin’s Creed 7-card packs and price

MTG’s Universes Beyond: Assassin’s Creed set has recently gone live for pre-orders, and some fans are less than pleased with the set’s price.

Universes Beyond brings world-renowned pop-culture properties like Warhammer and The Lord of the Rings to the tabletop as MTG cards.

This crossover initiative has seen several successes so far. But if player reactions to a recent listing are anything to go by, Universes Beyond might be about to see its first major flop with Assassin’s Creed.

MTG fans react to Assassin’s Creed boosters

WOTC/Ubisoft

While listings for hyped MTG sets can often be met with excitement, the reaction to Universes Beyond: Assasin’s Creed Beyond Boosters going up for pre-order has trended in the opposite direction.

In a Reddit thread discussing the listing, the top-rated comment by user AnwaAnduril is:

“It feels bad to say, but I’m hoping this product fails badly.”

This is their next attempt at 6-card packs. If it succeeds, they’ll sit there and say “See, players love beyond boosters, we’ll do 4 a year”. If it flops, then aftermath boosters may actually be done.”

The pack size is a real sticking point for players, offering a smaller selection of cards than play boosters without meaningfully adjusting the product’s price to account for it.

Many users rallied around commenter F0me’s statement of frustration:

“Don’t you guys love feeling like you’re part of a marketing experiment at all times?”

Have we seen this MTG booster drama before?

While reactions to the Assassin’s Creed Beyond Boosters are largely negative, this backlash isn’t simply coming out of the blue. There was a similar furor around the contents and cost of the Epilogue Boosters released for 2023’s March of the Machine: The Aftermath.

WOTC

Wizards appear to have drastically misjudged what the player base’s reaction to Epilogue Boosters would be. With fewer cards both per set and per booster and a much more frequent rate of repeats when buying multiple packs from the set, fans made their disappointment known.

Epilogue Boosters have since been scrapped – with the planned Epilogue-style ‘Big Score’ set being rolled into the main Outlaws of Thunder Junction set. Universes Beyond: Assassin’s Creed’s Beyond Boosters are currently the only announced Epilogue-style boosters on the slate for release, with MTG players speculating that Wizards may have had their hands tied when it came to releasing these boosters.

As supposed by user WillowSmithsBFF on Reddit:

“I think they understand how hated that set was. I would imagine the contract/details for Assassin’s card quantity/design/etc, were locked in with Ubisoft before they saw the reception of Aftermath. Not as easy to adjust your plans for an IP you don’t own, and a contract you’ve already signed.”

MTG players vs. Universes Beyond

In another point against the Assassin’s Creed Beyond Boosters, Universes Beyond is still a sore spot among many MTG fans. Each of the full crossover sets released so far – from Warhammer 40K to Fallout – have delighted through their mechanical innovation and faithfulness to the source material. But even then, the specter of Hasbro looms large.

There is an increasing worry that these crossover sets will eventually push out MTG’s main sets and worlds, ruining the core of the game for the sake of brand synergy and profits. These fears have yet to be founded, but it can be a difficult line to walk as more and more Universes Beyond sets launch.

While there is a general consensus that the card designs for this Assassin’s Creed set are well thought out, there is a convincing argument that this property isn’t as natural a fit for MTG as previous crossovers.

MTG’s Assassin’s Creed set features smaller size boosters

The smaller number of cards in the set than past Universes Beyond releases only furthers the argument that Assassin’s Creed doesn’t feature a wide enough roster of memorable characters to fill out the ranks of the set, outside of franchise stalwarts like Ezio and Eivor.

Reddit user GladiatorDragon believes that this would actually work in Beyond Boosters’ favor, but only if they were “priced and allocated properly”. As part of the same reveal thread, they state:

“Beyond Boosters should be applied to collaborations that aren’t “worthy” of the full set or 4 deck treatment – like if there’s not enough material for a full set – but they should be priced appropriately.”

While Universes Beyond: Assassin’s Creed could still defy early predictions and emerge as another successful set for MTG, players will see for themselves once the set launches on July 5.

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