Archive Keeper | Anatomy of a Booster Pack: A Curious Sorcery Distinctive
Written by Archive Keeper
Remember asking your parents for a pack of trading cards when you went shopping? Remember cracking a pack of cards and having no idea their rarity, or that card rarity even existed?
We’ve come a long way since then. Many thoughts and much ink have been spilled regarding the anatomy of a trading card pack. The analysis has explored many alternatives, from the sequence of rarities and their ratios to themes and/or parts of a pack. There's a broad range of divergent philosophies on pack anatomy to ponder.
I'll explain what I love about Sorcery: Contested Realm (SCR) booster pack card arrangement. Since my first box opening, I have felt that Erik's Curiosa provides more anticipation and excitement than any other pack-cracking experience. The more packs I've opened for fun and for Limited play, the more I appreciate the unique experience and nuances of SCR's card organization.
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The classic arrangement from the first packs of Magic: The Gathering (MTG) and Pokémon in the mid-90s was to sort the cards by ascending rarity. Usually, one high-rarity card was in the back of the pack. The pack's front featured some medium-rarity cards behind the lowest-rarity cards, which comprised the bulk of the pack.
That rarity sequence is the most intuitive way to set cards into a pack. The designers' goal is an emotional crescendo that culminates in the discovery of the rarest card at the back of the pack. Good or bad, the rush of unspent emotions at the end of a pack fuels the desire to open another, much like a child at the bottom of a slide shouts, “Again! Again!”
The issue with this became that the pack opening hobbyist. The hope-led opening one pack to the next changed once it was clear where the payoff was. Why bother with the build when you could quickly swipe straight to the juice?
The shortcut erodes the pack opening experience. The traditional ascending method is hiccup-free for Limited, but presents a lackluster pack-opening experience elsewhere — industry leaders have tried different pack layouts time and time again.
Pokémon is the exception to the rule. Pokémon is notorious for being collected rather than played. They have remained steadfast in the ascending-rarity pack layout, achieving great success.
The SCR booster pack, of which there is mercifully only one variety, is organized as follows: three Exceptional cards, one Elite or Unique card, then 11 Ordinary cards.
Sorcery: Contested Realm Card Rarity
• Ordinary — most common
• Exceptional — second-most common
• Elite — second-most rare
• Unique — most rare
In Limited, this streamlines selection, putting the most scrutinizable cards up front. This is satisfying every time I crack packs in Sealed. In Draft, it may not hold up past the first pass, as a sneaky strategist might rearrange the pack to dodge their opponent’s pursuit of a valued card. Still, being able to open a new pack and quickly see the likely top picks feels efficient.
By seeing higher rarities first, I can more effectively judge the Ordinary cards in context.
“Is this Ordinary better than one of the first four cards in the pack?”
Limited is my favorite way to enjoy a trading card game (TCG). I am grateful for the comfort and efficiency of SCR's pack arrangement.
The shining triumph of SCR's pack alignment is for the simple joy of opening them. If you’ve played MTG before SCR, you likely remember the joy of opening packs dwindling with each successive year. By 2020, opening MTG packs felt more of a chore than an engaging and enjoyable pastime.
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Luckily, the joy in sealed packs didn't vanish; it was just uprooted and misplaced. SCR rekindled the mystery and suspense of opening a pack. There is beauty in the art, the captivating flavor, the lore teased in every card, and in the pack anatomy.
Three Exceptional at the front of the pack is the perfect appetizer. We start the pack opening amidst a crescendo, at an above-average rarity where the pack opener is likely to find something exciting to play.
We move from a shortened rising action to the structured pack climax. Though not a new idea, I enjoy placing the chase card toward the front, but not at the front. When opening a pack, I get to the good stuff quickly, but I can build anticipation first.
The next genius of SCR pack anatomy comes after the “big hit” slot. Four cards in, you’ve seen all the Exceptionals, the Elite, or the Unique. Ordinary at the end are the Limited foundationals or the less-expensive building blocks for a Constructed deck.
The enchanting departure from the norm in a SCR pack is two-fold:
- The art is stunning. The hand-painted art on each SCR card is a gift. SCR has more in common with the Sistine Chapel than it does with the signs in Times Square. Indeed, the oil-on-canvas painting printed SCR cards shares more soul with the Trevi Fountain than a mural of a polar bear drinking Coca-Cola.
- The reason is the intent. Art that is made to be seen rather than sold. Erik's Curiosa could acquire cheaper art, but spending money on hand-painted art shows a greater care for the game's culture than for its immediate bottom line. This is the dividing line between nihilism and quixotism.
- In the hundreds of SCR packs I have opened, I have never tired of thumbing through the Ordinary cards after seeing the Elite or Unique card. Appreciating the handcrafted portraits is akin to listening to beautiful music; it feeds the soul.
- Thumbing through SCR cards after the Elite or Unique card is enjoyable because the hits *may* not be over! You could find a foil card, or the fabled Curio oddities of widening fame.
- Foils are more common than a Curio; roughly one-in-four experience that maintains adrenaline — who knows what could be hidden within the Ordinary cards. SCR foils are impeccably detailed via rotoscoping, the process by which card regions are foiled or not. This gives foils depth. I’ve never seen or felt anything like it in any other game.
- For example, Mandrake Jars foil bits and bobs against a flat background create an atmosphere of gruesome suspense. The Faerie Queen's foiling is luminous amidst an otherwise dark and empty forest.
- Finding a foil shining through the Ordinary cards is exciting, but nothing compares to catching a Curio. Maybe the most fascinating mystery of the TCG world, Curios don't officially exist.
- SCR's card index is amusingly bereft of any mention of Curios.
- Curios don’t exist on TCGPlayer, the largest card market in North America.
- Tracking Curios requires community effort for record-keeping. To buy Curios, you must use a marketplace like eBay or Discord.
- Despite all this, the concept of a Curio is strikingly straightforward: a cosmetically different card variant. Calling them “alternate arts” would be a disservice to the expansive range of Curios.
- Some are flavorful reinterpretations of the original art, framed in a style befitting the set but not necessarily SCR, such as the Wyvern Curio.
- Some Curios have prototype art, or are printed in greyscale, like the Realm Eater Curio, or the four Alpha Avatar Curios. Others contain only tiny differences, like the odd letter deletion that turns “Troll Bridge” into “Toll Bridge” or the slight offset in the Shameless Squire Curio that makes the word “drops” look like it’s been dropped in the textbox.
- What a Curio must be is clear, but what a Curio can be is limitless. As with any Easter egg that lingers without developer recognition, there’s forever the possibility Curios go unnoticed. There could well be Curios undiscovered from previous sets. There may be Curios in the bulk storage.
- Foils are more common than a Curio; roughly one-in-four experience that maintains adrenaline — who knows what could be hidden within the Ordinary cards. SCR foils are impeccably detailed via rotoscoping, the process by which card regions are foiled or not. This gives foils depth. I’ve never seen or felt anything like it in any other game.
If you want to share SCR experiences that fill your soul:
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Featured image: Mandrake Jars by Francesca Baerald