iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 26/06/2026

I was so thrilled we could publish something new from Kristen that I signed into Bluesky for the first time in like a year. Hello!

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 26/06/2026

Glad I looked here after getting a suspicious message from you on Discord :(

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 08/08/2025

I'm pretty sure I specific did not include Birds of Paradise because why would need mana of other colors and it had no power to attack with. I probably added Fyndhorn Elves when Ice Age came out.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 08/08/2025

At 13 years old my favorite deck was Wild Growths, Instill Energy, Llanowar Elves, Force of Nature and Giant Growth. And Lifeforce to stop any Terror/Dark Banishing shenanigans.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 08/08/2025

Spellify Hard Mode 405 💀 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟥✅ edhrec.com/games/spelli... I just learned this is a thing. Games are good. Games about games are also good.

edhrec.com

Spellify Hard Mode - EDHREC Games

A Magic: the Gathering hangman-style word game by EDHREC

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 24/07/2025

This will eventually be the sites account once I make some time to switch my personal stuff to another account

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 24/07/2025

Was gonna do another EOE draft stream but then my 7yo had a tantrum when it was time to turn the Switch off and my fridge sprung a leak and the shutoff valve is the same as the dishwasher so now I need a plumber and I have a dentist appointment tomorrow and... no stream tonight, but now its setup

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Got too excited from doing my first stream that I forgot to take a sceenshot of the draft deck. Anyways I went 1-3 with RW spaceships. Lot's of fun. I'll try streaming again later tonight once the kids are asleep. Thanks again to WotC for the free early access EOE event.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Good lord I'm going to stream an EOE draft. I've looked at virtually no previews. This should be fun! Thanks to Wizards of the Coast for the completely free invite to the EOE Early Access event!

twitch.tv

RichStein13 - Twitch

Drafting Magic the Gathering Edge of Eternities Early Access Event (Free Access from Wizards of the Coast)

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Alright, I'll give it a shot, thanks!

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

How do I start streaming MTG Arena? Asking for a friend who got an invite to EOE Early Access for the first time ever and has no clue what they're doing because they have only ever published written content.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Early access Edge of Eternities drafts? I've never done the whole "streaming" thing before but maybe I should learn?

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Collecting is definitely a massive driver for tabletop. I'm not surprised tabletop brought in way more revenue than digital. What I'm surprised by is that digital revenue was down at all, especially given Monopoly Go! raking in money.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

That's a great point. How many people took the money they'd normally spend on Arena and just bought as much physical product as they could? Especially the Collectors boxes given the BANANAS prices for some (a lot of) cards! Shooting themselves in the foot!

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

That's certainly a fair take!

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Believe me, I'm pulling for this thing. There's nothing I'd love more than a great 3D VTT for D&D that seamlessly integrates with my D&D Beyond account and all my encounters, monsters, etc., and player data. But yeah, the rollout of Sigil has been kinda lackluster.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

That's possible. I wonder if they decided to change the definition of who counts as a player? Hasbro claims Magic has 50M fans. It would take a big # of self-reporters to bring the avg up by even a month let alone 5 years. The FF release stuff is the only explanation I can think of for WPN stores

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

That's all I have on this. Would love to hear other people's thoughts that aren't related to how G.I. Joe and Transformers are holding the company back (they're not).

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

That's a big change in 3 mos. Who's doing this accounting? We trust Wizards to understand their consumers. Mark Rosewater talks about the marketing research they do and the trust they put in that. But to be off 17% on a key demographic like age, and to miscount retailers by 25%? What gives?

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Anyways, the third thing to focus on is the Magic info box that was towards the end of the presentation. This is in my article for Hipsters. Three months ago for Q1 earnings, Wizards said the average player was 30 and there were 7500 WPN stores. Now its 35 and there are 9000 WPN stores.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Or, is Dungeons and Dragons Beyond such a money pit that it weighs everything down? D&D recently tried to move into the 3D virtual tabletop space with Sigil but it doesn't seem to be building momentum yet. I don't think it was mentioned in the earnings report at all.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Is Magic Arena losing players? Are players not spending as much money? Where Tabletop Magic is very clearly relying on Commander and collectibles (Secret Lairs) as cash cows, what is Arena relying on? You'd think giving away all those Final Fantasy Collector Booster Boxes would have had some impact?

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Magic Arena is a big part of Wizards' overall strategy, so much so that they completely off-boarded Magic the Gathering Online to a 3rd-party vendor. But Digital Games revenue is down quarter-over-quarter and that's supposedly with Monopoly Go! bringing in a ton of money.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

Second, do pay attention to the vast gulf between Tabletop and Digital revenue! Why does Final Fantasy's success result in massive revenue shifts in Tabletop but not Digital? Digital LOST revenue this quarter. This is a story not a lot of folks are looking at, but it should be.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

First, don't pay attention to the "goodwill impairment charge" mostly because it applies to the consumer goods side of the company, which I think we've all known has been floundering for a while. The impairment is likely an acknowledgement of the shifting waters in that industry and Hasbro's role.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

I wrote a short news piece for Hipsters on it this morning, but because our preference for news articles is to provide facts and context I didn't provide too much editorial. We want people to know the difference. And I didn't want anyone to misconstrue financial advice. But I do have opinions...

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 23/07/2025

A short discussion on Hasbro's Q2 earnings, because you should hear it from someone who's been covering this for a long time, not some random redditor who has no idea what a goodwill impairment is. www.hipstersofthecoast.com/2025/07/fina...

hipstersofthecoast.com

Final Fantasy Drives 23% Increase in Magic Revenue According to Hasbro Q2 Results

Hasbro reported quarterly earnings including a 23% increase in Magic revenue and a 17% increase in the average age of Magic players.

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Dominarian Plowshare @mtgplowshare.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

I wrote for @hipstersofthecoast.com on the literary difficulty and exuberant wonder of Seth Dickinson’s Edge of Eternities fiction! All praise to @donnycaltrider.bsky.social for everything in the world. www.hipstersofthecoast.com/2025/07/edge...

hipstersofthecoast.com

Edge of Eternities and the Power of Difficulty

Ryan peers into the literary style of Edge of Eternities, to look at how words and worlds impact our grasp of science fiction.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 06/07/2025

I wrote about this like a decade ago when I reviewed (almost) every Magic novel, but yes, Urza is a bad person, and the story reinforces terrible ideas. Every person involved was morally and ethically bankrupt except Hurkyl, Rebbec, and Kayla.

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Allison Gill @muellershewrote.com · 06/07/2025

Fuck this guy forever.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 02/07/2025

Until there's clear leadership from the Dem party, this will never happen. No one is able to unite the party and no one seems invested in trying.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 02/07/2025

We drove through white castle to get a crave case. I was told we'd be drafting all night. The friend who showed up to stay on the floor was @misterorange.bsky.social and that was the first time I ever got to Cube Draft. Worlds 2008 was amazing and WotC should come back to NYC soon.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 02/07/2025

I'm packing for vacation, so here's another fun story from my MTG youth. In 2007, I moved from Binghamton to Brooklyn. When the 2008 World Championship came around, two of my friends from Bingo, Ryan and Kenny, asked to crash on my couch. Kenny had one more friend coming and I said sure, why not.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 02/07/2025

I borrowed Bazaars from a friend and played this deck in a Vintage side-event on Sunday at the Grand Prix. I think the idea came from the MTG Salvation forums. It was too funny a combo not to try out. A few months later, Narcomoeba and Bridge completed the deck engine, but I loved Sutured Ghoul.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 02/07/2025

I played Manaless Dredge before Bridge from Below. At GP New Jersey in 2006, a month after Time Spiral came out. The deck relied on using Bazaar of Baghdad to put Dread Return, Sutured Ghoul, and Dragon's Breath into the 'yard. Nether Shadows and Ichorids returned to play to flashback Dread Return.

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 02/07/2025

i'm reading this charles sumner speech from february 1866 and my dude is cooking

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Danny Miller @danielmilleresq.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

I’ll be honest. I have a sick feeling in my stomach about this. About ICE’s new budget. About the citizenship database. I just have a really sick feeling. The only way we survive this is together. We need to work together. In ways we never have before. Collective action is the way.

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Michael Jay McClure @mjmimages.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

Andry José Hernández Romero, I remember you, even if I do not know how to articulate my horror, rage, & sorrow at your treatment by my government. No one has heard from you in 109 days. As vigil, I’m posting a photo or video of you every day until you are returned from El Salvador.

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David Corn @davidcorn.bsky.social · 29/06/2025

In a less imperfect world, Musk and Trump would be forever cast as killers of children, and this would be front-page news for months and the subject of Sunday sermons in every church.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 29/06/2025

If you weren't connecting to Prodigy Online in 1994 with a 14.4k modem, your back probably felt fine today.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 27/06/2025

Finally snagged a trophy in FIN draft

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no brain, only alison @alisonborealis.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

ICE just murdered a Canadian.

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 27/06/2025

Absolutely the truth right here

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Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 26/06/2025

Warren on CNBC on Mamdani: "You misunderstand what his campaign was about. His campaign was saying, 'I want to invest in NYC. I want to invest in people being able to have good jobs here, put their kids in school and build housing.' And he built a grassroots campaign. He didn't have a billionaire."

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RichStein13 @hipstersofthecoast.com · 25/06/2025

But he's definitely got this Iran/Israel thing figured out

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