MUT22 - No Money Spent (Madden Ultimate Team)

[QuikSand]

At 6.5 on the strength of a new 91 card that, I guess, people are buying with their temporary Blitz Bits currency. It’s a funky market.

I’ve been buying the 94 rated cards from the last promo, Bo Knows, at around training value (under 135k) and they reliably sell at 160+. So that’s been a profitable churn thus far. I’ll end up keeping one CB Walls for the Browns, eventually. But the plan is, I think, to sit on maybe 10 of them after the Blitz promo ends, to see if the market goes back up. If so, maybe I can sell them off at 200 rather than 166.

[QuikSand]

Training now selling under 6… the 91 LB Fowler is driving the plunge I think…

The driving force is the 94 Bo Jackson card about to be released. You do stuff to get Blitz Bits (temporary currency), when you buy stuff like the 91 card with your bits you get Blitz Packs, and you need a boatload of those to get Bo starting tomorrow. So, if you mostly want Bo, you just sell off the 91 Fowler. So the market is overloaded with 91 Fowlers right now. He quick sells for 7,000 training, and he’s now around 40-44K.

Anyway…lots at work here. Like… will these 91 Fowler cards be selling at 45K tomorrow? 55k? More? Yesterday’s special 91 was selling at 50K and already is fetching 70K or so. But that was a RT, a high price position. I don’t know what to do here, I’ve got about 10x of the Fowler as I felt 48 then 46 then 44 was a great buying opportunity. Now what?

[QuikSand]

Market inching up today, back to around 7. I have about 25x of the 91 Fowler cards from yesterday, bought for about 45k each I’d say. In the days ahead I’ll hope to see an adjustment in the overall market, and if these cards sell for a net of 60 I’ll clear 3-400k from the risk. Hard to see the market going down from here, so worst case is I sell off slowly at modest or no gains.

[QuikSand]

Meanwhile, my Browns team is nearly maxed out… McGahee doesn’t feel better than Chubb but I’m running him for now. I never got the big Marino card, still rolling with tricked out Mariota who is a great fit. Last piece left is to fully power up CB Walls and probably move a CB back into the safety rotation, likely McCourty I guess.

[QuikSand]

I’m around 2m in coins… have spent a little on my CLE team, have been fiddling around with the pieces I’d need for the MIA roster, but I’m cycling more than keeping for now.

Myles Garrett, by the way, is a game wrecker playing DT across from the RG, so my itch for a bona fide DT has cooled off.

Today’s 91 Blitz card is TE Jonny Smith, and neve mr got cheap into the 40s like the last two… he’s been selling around 65 and I’m sitting it out. Mostly just poaching guys around the training price and immediately re-listing for 20% more, just churning coins while the market feels so safe. If I get stuck with any of these, it feels unlikely I suffer…just cash them for training or flip them later for whatever I can get.

[Travis]

Out of curiosity, how much time would you say you've spent in the Auction House vs playing challenges and the like? I was really into MUT a few years ago but wore out with the amount of time I had to spend in the AH on a regular basis to keep my theme team going (and was nowhere nearly as effective with it as you are showing in this thread). This was also back when it all had to be done in game vs app/web based (I think you mentioned earlier that's a thing now)?

[QuikSand]

Very fair question. My son likes to play challenges, so we have been bonding over that here and there. He likes easy ones, I like hard ones. He's 8, I am no longer 8.

I have the Madden Companion App on my phone and iPad, and fiddle with it for a little bit here and there, multiple trimes, every day. I would not be anywhere near as effective in MUT as I am if it were not for the app, which is information-loaded beyond what is accessible in-game, and much easier to simply pick up for ten minutes between meetings, etc.

I'd guess I spend 5 hours a week in the app (or on MUT related websites), and maybe another 3-5 on the console. It's not a hobby you can really push without some investment of time.

This year they seem to have decided to add a lot more "free reward" players for those who engage with the game at least a bit... like right now each week if you play two pretty easy challenges, you get a free 90-rated Team of the Week card (that cannot be sold, auctioned, traded, or used in sets) -- so they are definitely keeping the low-time-investment players involved enough that they don't just walk away for lack of any degree of competitiveness.

I honestly don't think I recommend this as a hobby. I'm too compulsive and can't let it go, I spend too much time with this given the real world competition for my hours of attention.

[QuikSand]

Four new 94-rated Bo Knows players today... QB Randall Cunningham among them and the most intriguing, I think. Nobody who fits onto the Browns, Dolphins, or even Chargers theme teams, so nothing of direct interest here. LB Singletary, WR Swann, an DT Wilfork as well.

[Travis]

Thanks for the details. I do really enjoy having access to Madden when I have the itch to play some football but yeah, the days of spending enough focused time on it to properly play MUT and avoid the temptation to spend are probably gone for me. But damned if that temptation to open packs is not a strong one and they sure know it.

[QuikSand]

Blitz promo is over, and so is training under 7. Back up over 8 today, as predicted. Should be a good deal of slow profits as I shed these many 90, 91, and 94 players I grabbed while they were cheap.

[QuikSand]

It’s clearer to me now than at the start… the Blitz promo is definitely built for money spenders. I didn’t even mention here all the good deals available for $10 or $20 or $80 worth of “points” available only through real money. So, I was misguided thinking this was a window to improve the roster… nope, just the bottom line.

I did use the down market to buy up most of the cards I’d need to play a Dolphins roster. We’ll see if perhaps Tua is among the giveaway 90 cards fir this week… if so, that could be the nudge I needed to give that a real spin.

[QuikSand]

It looks like the 91 Fowler card, that I still hold about 20 copies of, will sell today in the high 60s. I bought at roughly 45 each. 30% or better profit is nice, I figure I’ll sell off most of them in the days ahead. It’s abundant but basically “out of print” as all the Blitz stuff was for limited time windows. I wish I had moved in harder on the 92 SS Derwin James, that was the even bigger hit, in retrospect.

[QuikSand]

A quick retrospective on the 94 Bo Knows first wave. I went in pretty hard, buying a lot in the <140K range, but was flipping them for 170K every chance I could, just trying to churn. It was successful. As the price was drifting up a bit, I was holding maybe 16 of them, when I heard there was a promo coming up in Blitz to buy one of these cards. I sold about half my stock then around 170 or so, fearing/expecting a market drop during that window… but it never came.

So, I have 7 of them in hand now, including one CB Walls I intend to keep and use soon. Market seems up a bit, so I could likely get 180K-200K now, maybe a bit more soon. I hit this one pretty well, but sold off a bit too low guessing there was going to be another big bite at the Apple which didn’t happen.

[QuikSand]

Market back to 9

[QuikSand]

Back of envelope, I think I probably ground out around 1.4m in value during the Blitz promo. I had forgotten the specifics from last year, but this is mainly a program for money spenders… When, in reality, this is a program not really designed for me. Regardless, I definitely did the right thing by liquidating as much as I could in advance, maxing out my coin balance, and then buying a lot of cards while the market was down. I didn’t keep scrupulous notes, but I know I turned a lot of cards and made small profits within the 4-5 day program, and I still have Quite a number of cards in my inventory that can and will sale at prices higher than my purchase point, even after taxes.

I think if I fully liquidated right now, other than the players I am actively using, I would probably be over 5 million in cash… Plus I’d have the backbone of a dolphins team team, and fully maxed out a couple more players on the Browns team. Not bad.

Next promo Zero Chill will likely stretch out across a few weeks, will include many more new players (and possibly some appetizing sets). Last year, I parked on one or two of the sets in the zero chill program and built and rebuilt the same Rod Woodson card over and over again for a profit every time. That’s my jam.

[QuikSand]

Bored

[Chas in Cinti]

I mean... empty cupboard or restricted roster challenges are just out there waiting to be played and written up...

[QuikSand]

Up over 4.8m in cash now, a new high for this year.

[QuikSand]

About 5.8m with nearly everything extra sold off.

Today two new Legends, that’s usually a buying opportunity as people rip packs to get Legends, get stuff they don’t want, and oversupply the market. I guess I’ll try to buy some stuff cheap.

[QuikSand]

Topped 6.3 before buying up some cards to semi-finish my Miami roster. It’s kinda fun, a QB away from being pretty lively. I refuse to play Mariota there, for now, so it’s an 89 Tannehill for now.

Big week ahead…changing the “season” means some stuff, plus a new program “Zero Chill” on Friday. My favorite content creator Gutfoxx predicting a big market crash ahead, which I’m well suited for. Bring it on.

[QuikSand]

The Limited card with the TOTW tomorrow is a 95 WR Devante Parker, too. Whoa.

[QuikSand]

So I have built out my Dolphins theme team to where I had my Browns for some time… nearly complete, short only a few particularly expensive cards. This is my dilemma with a market of perpetual price drops… that 94 Brandon Marshall and the current LTD 95 Devante Parker would give me a top-end pair at WR. But they’d cost me $1m in coins to buy right now. Over time they’ll get cheaper.

But this IS prime playing time. Last year I perpetually denied myself the Parker in the exact same situation- he was an expensive limited selling for 700K or so and I sat and envied it until it was no longer a special card. Ugh. Then I ended up the year with a few million in mostly unusable cards.

So, we’ll see. Good LTD cards tend to go up in price once they’re no longer “in print.” So, buy the Parker now at 500k? Buy a few?

[Travis]

Buy them, enjoy them! Is Marshall one of the top run blocking WR the way he used to be?

[QuikSand]

Marshall is big and physical and that has value in this game where tons of speed guys are effectively clones. He’s still really pricey but I think they’ll re-release 94 LTD cards soon as Redux, and I’ll buy him then.

I have bought 2x DVP and even a copy of the 95 Dan Marino. So, I’m trying to move in your direction.

LTD FS Minkah Fitzpatrick out today, too. Rains, pours.

[QuikSand]

Meanwhile I’m stuck away from home, they started a new “season” and I can’t access the app until I’ve advanced a level via console. So a dead day.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

So I have built out my Dolphins theme team to where I had my Browns for some time… nearly complete, short only a few particularly expensive cards. This is my dilemma with a market of perpetual price drops… that 94 Brandon Marshall and the current LTD 95 Devante Parker would give me a top-end pair at WR. But they’d cost me $1m in coins to buy right now. Over time they’ll get cheaper.

But this IS prime playing time. Last year I perpetually denied myself the Parker in the exact same situation- he was an expensive limited selling for 700K or so and I sat and envied it until it was no longer a special card. Ugh. Then I ended up the year with a few million in mostly unusable cards.

So, we’ll see. Good LTD cards tend to go up in price once they’re no longer “in print.” So, buy the Parker now at 500k? Buy a few?

So I bought a DVP when he dipped below 500 to have and use, and when he dipped down to 440 I bought another as a short term investment. Worked. Sold last night for 575, price still around there now, just a few days out of print. So that was good.

It’s tricky as I don’t really want to be stuck with lots of cards if there is, indeed, a market crash - but it’s not showing yet. A window yesterday when the market moved from 9 to 7.5 or so as they released the Zero Chill program, but apparently no changes in pack odds to undergird a change and it’s back to around 9. Legends today may help, but fairly unexciting, I think.

[QuikSand]

Market has risen slowly but surely since yesterday early afternoon… And now it’s back up over nine. There did not seem to be much of a dip this morning with new legends cards came out, maybe they just were not very exciting… Both cards were players who spent their entire career with one franchise, making them a bit less exciting for the many people who run theme teams. I am pretty well situated for a high cost market, I’m not really looking to buy very many things right now.

[QuikSand]

Market closing in on 10 coins per training, and I don't understand why.

[QuikSand]

These Bo Knows 94 cards are selling around 230K… wow, I felt good unloading in the 190s.

[QuikSand]

As always, when I start following a set of cards for a while, I start to pick up on the spaces for value to be gained. Watching the Dolphins cards 92-93 and 94-95 I’ve been flipping the 93 Will Fuller (buy <200, sell 240s) and now 95 Devante Parker (just sold for 679). Gotta keep grinding.

Have 4.8m in cash, Dolphins team short about 3-4 high end cards from being completely maxed out, but playing well with Mariota rather than the seemingly overrated Marino.

[QuikSand]

Back to 5.5m after cashing out a couple more big ticket flips.

[QuikSand]

So, one of the most annoying tropes in MUT is that theme teamers gripe when releases miss them. But this week’s cycle of Bo Knows players, now bounced up to 95, is just absurd. The already stacked Raiders, Jets, and Patriots just keep getting star caliber players. All my teams just sit and wait.

The winter promo caps on Dec 25 with a big flurry of “presents” revealing, and signs point toward one of them being Xavien Howard, which the Dolphins team really needs. I’ll look forward to that, I suppose. But my wishful thinking about John Offerdahl or Keith Jackson or Bernie Kosar or Paul Warfield or richmond Webb or Louis Oliver or … ugh, never mind.

[QuikSand]

The Jets theme team was already dizzyingly strong, and of todays four new 95 players, three get Jets chemistry. That’s silly, especially for a team that’s had a rather depressing run these last, oh I dunno, 50 years.

[QuikSand]

New Stocking Stuffers program coking out Wednesday, 32 cards so it sure sounds like one for each franchise…. Bring it!

[QuikSand]

Well, hard to get better fits for my theme teams than the just announced stocking stuffers, 92 rated cards coming out tomorrow:

DT Malik McDowell for Browns
DT Christian Wilkins for Dolphins

W

[QuikSand]

So, with the Stocking Stuffers program, now out, a couple of things designed to be good for the :No Money Spent" crowd like me:

-a pretty do-able set of solo challenges nets you one non-sellable 92 guy, good

-there's a set, where you trade in any 3x of the 92s, and you get a sell-able 94 Master from this set, plus any 3x of the 92s in non-sellable format

Bottom line, at today's (high, since they just came out) pricing, I could go and get (buy) the three cheapest 92s out there for roughly 170K each, then do the set to get a 94, hand pick the three 92 guys who fit with my MIA and CLE theme teams (MLB Christian Kirksey played for the Browns originally) to get back as non-sellables, then sell the 94 card for something like 400K (net 360) and only be out around 150K for the whole affair. Very good value, to be honest.

[QuikSand]

There’s uncertainty about what the MUT market might do tomorrow with the next phase of the Zero Chill program out… plus a sizable wave of formerly limited edition 94 cards being re-released in packs as Redux. Without a pack odds boost… I’d guess very little change, but I’m getting fidgety to train up some guys, would love to buy lower, even if it’s just fleeting.

[QuikSand]

Market slightly over 10… no crash today. Hoping Legends tomorrow moves the needle, but without a pack odds change, probably not.

[QuikSand]

It's just weird... I'm itchy to train up and max out a few of my Dolphins (95 WR Devante Parker, 94 DE Jason Taylor) but to do that I need training, and it still feels sooooo expensive to buy cards for training right now. While the market is semi-soft I have just purchased some cards -- all 91-rated, meaning they quicksell for 7,000 training each -- and I'm getting them at or just below 70,000 coins for a price of about 10, maybe a shade below.

What stinks is that I still remember buying a ton of training for 6-7 coins per a few weeks ago during the Blitz promo. I have since sold off (or quicksold) all those cards, so I have cash in hand for buying low... but it's still hard to crowbar open the wallet to buy training at these high-again prices.

[QuikSand]

Browns RG Joe Dellamiellure is out tomorrow as a 95, endgame quality. He’ll need to power up to gain CLE chem, so pricey, but still great to have.

[QuikSand]

Today is a big day for the MUT world, a big wave of new content... but for the many of us who are strictly theme team players, it's always a mixed bag. It again feels like the usual franchises are getting fed (Cowboys WTAF man) but many of the rest of us have little to do here. With a huge wave of 95-96 cards rolling out, I'm looking at zero Dolphins and apparently one Browns 92 CB (Greg Newsome, rookie) who would contend for but not necessarily even get a starting job on my squad right now.

So, unless I'm open to bending my own rules and playing a "best team" or whatever it would take to use some of these exciting new cards... yawn here.

[QuikSand]

Well, I am trying to capitalize on a little speculation right now. There has been a leak of what the principal named players will be will be revealed on December 25 in the morning, when in game presents open. Among them is RB Ricky Williams, who might end up being the new most powerful running back in the game. Anticipating this big card coming, and becoming popular quickly, I am stocking up on the 90 rated version of the same player… Knowing that people who want to max out Rikki will need the intermediate card to fully power up there’s to maximum value. I now have about 12 copies of the 90 rated card, purchased anywhere from 80 to 100 K in coins, each. I have many of them for sale at 1:40 or 150 already, and I am hoping to be there when there is a day or two of spike in this particular cards demand. If I am right, and I can Deal all these cards for 150 or better, this will be a nice hit. If I am wrong, and they drop down to trade in value, I probably lose half a million or so.

[QuikSand]

Meanwhile, after getting my cash balance up well over 6m recently, I’ve just dipped below 3m and it feels weird.

[QuikSand]

RG Wyatt Teller gets a nice 93 card… that plus the CB Greg Newsome should keep the Browns roster inching forward (while the big franchises take leaps and bounds).

[QuikSand]

Admittedly, I am pretty sick of playing QB Marcus Mariota on both of these theme teams. It is legal, it is within the rules, or the concept… But it is just not rewarding. At its best, a theme theme should feel like you are really using players from that actual franchise. In the process of trying to sprinkle in a bunch of extra players to help theme teams out, I fear that EA has actually undermined what makes them feel cool.

I really do not want to be playing Marcus Mariota, or some other player who has no affiliation with the dolphins at all, when I suit up my all dolphins theme theme. I want to play Bob Griese, or Dan Marino, or Tua Tagovailoa, or whomever. Same thing for my defensive line, my office of wine, etc.… It is functionally nice for them to give me a player like Lance Alworth and pretend he played for the dolphins.But we both know he never did.

[QuikSand]

So, the Ricky Williams plan is pretty straightforward— on 12/25 lots of people will see their “presents” acquired through their recent efforts turn into special packs and players. If the rumor/leak is true, one such player is a big 96? RB Ricky Williams. If so, lots of people will suddenly have that card, with two obvious options:

-sell it (meaning s glut of supply, and a buy-low opportunity)

-use it (meaning they’ll want to max him out, requiring the power up card AND the 90-rated card needed along the way… driving demand for the 90)

I have already made a pretty big bet on this, accumulating about a dozen of the 90 rated cards. The obvious follow through, it seems to me, it’s for me to buy 345, however many I can of the big card when they become available on the 25th. Ideally, I will be selling off my 90s at high prices, and buying a 96s at low prices, at roughly the same time. In a perfect situation, I end up with one copy for myself, and a bag of money to go along with it.

[QuikSand]

…continuing the Ricky Williams profiteering I’m now spelunking into the Team Diamonds set for the 90 card. Much like the Andre Rison that I completed maybe 30 times or so, there’s not only profit in finishing the set but also spiking prices on the last copy or two of any component piece. Grinding out 5k every so often this way now too.

[QuikSand]

As a rule, I philosophically don’t like the “Out of Position” element that has taken hold in Madden. I presume, years and years ago, this started out as a tiny novelty… A Randall Cunningham card as a punter, because he famously punted once or twice in real NFL games. Now, it is a centerpiece of multiple waves of contents over the course of the year… And serious players always look forward to specific players, like a Calvin Johnson playing free safety, which appears to be an annual renewal now. It doesn’t really map to anything in the real world.

So, this is a substantial element of the current promotion, zero chill, and there are a couple waves of out of position players newly available. I just don’t like it. It doesn’t feel like real football, it feels like a clown show.

Now, that said… It appears that tomorrow there is a 92 rated Odell Beckham Jr. card, where he is slotted as a half back with excellent receiving skills. That appears to be a general void in the game, there just are not very many running backs who are especially good in that regard. So, if this card gets Brown’s chemistry… And that is not clear to me whether it will… Then it could be a genuinely interesting card to play. So, I could suck up myTheoretical and philosophical objections, and knuckle under and see whether this is an interesting card.

[QuikSand]

I’m now up to 22 copies of the 90 Ricky Williams. Jacked to the tits.

[QuikSand]

96 Ricky Williams confirmed… Very good news. I have sold several of my 90 cards at about 160 K, now I’m getting greedy and trying to move that price up to 190 and 220… We shall see.