Every Friday night, we have FNM. 40-50 people show up to play either Standard, Legacy or Draft, with plenty of casual Commander play thrown in. Most of these players are regulars who I see at the store week after week and travel with to PPTQs or Grand Prix.
Every Saturday morning, we have a novice league. Some of our more generous players (who are the lifeblood of any LGS), come and help out as we teach new players the game with welcome decks or pre-built casual Standard decks to help them learn about the game. By a large margin, these players are typically younger, in some cases just learning the skills needed to even play a game of Magic. This is also where some of our budget brewers or kitchen table players who are used to coming to the store to buy cards but not compete in tournaments end up.
These players have a great time; after all, Magic is a great game.
But they never show up to FNM.
s players learn how to play Magic, they begin to graduate our Novice League. So where do they go next?
The reality is many don't go any further, for a very simple reason: there wasn't a clear progression. The only step forward available to them was to come to FNM, and we would encourage them to do so. Drafting is a scary experience for someone who's never done it and doesn't know any of the cards or even possibly the mechanics, so they usually end up at Standard with their as Blake Rasmussen put it Cat deck they just built.
So they show up to FNM, and they get paired against a Day 2 Grand Prix player in the first round piloting whatever the best deck at the time is. The Cat player casts Pride Sovereign, and is feeling good. Then two turns later they're dead and at a loss for what happened. Sometimes those players learn from the experience and show up the next week more prepared to battle. But more often, they just go back to having fun with friends at home.
As a store, that's not good for us. After all, as Wizards Play Network materials remind everyone, the number one predictor of a Magic player's lifetime value is whether or not they participate in in-store play. While we created our own intro experience for new players, the step up to the FNM level is so intense it makes the fall-off rate far higher than we would like. In case you're curious, this is why casual Commander has become so massively popular it's exactly where these players usually end up.
When players enter our Novice League for the first time, they are what Wizards defines as New Players. As they graduate, they become Interested Players, which Wizards defines as players interested in improving and stepping up their game. The FNM regulars? That's what Wizards defines as Engaged Players.
. Even rebuilding Twin into Nahiri Jeskai costed quite a bit, like I said and that you reiterated is that the staples will always be there, but you'll spend a bit of money on new cards or different decks. Standard players also usually get most of their cards from playing limited a lot.
