Well I am a collector I have been for years. Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, pocket watches, stamps, snow globes, et cetera. Now I want to get into Magic the Gathering. I have about eighty percent of the battle for zendikar set now (singles not play sets) and I do play from time to time, between college and work I don't have that much time to get down to the game shop and play.
So my questions are how do I go about starting a collection? When I played pokemon and yu-gi-oh back in the day I had one of each card in my binder never to play with and then I have a box full of duplicates that I do play with. So when it comes to Magic should I just collect one of each card and put them in a binder and never play with them and the get a play set for when I do play or should I collect a play set to put in a binder and a play set to play with?
Also how should I store my collection? Binders, boxes, portfolios? If I collect play sets should i get a four pocket binder/portfolio like the dragon hide?
Honestly? It all depends on how deep you want to go collecting.
One of my closest friends has a really big collection, basically complete from Antiquities and onwards and only missing a couple of what he calls "the good stuff" and, well, a couple cards from ORI, BFZ and now OGW. He also owns a Full foil collection from all the core sets starting from 7th.
He has each expansion in a binder with 3x3 sheets and each card individually sleeved. In addition the room has humidity and temp control. The room has a pool/MTG table aswell, we get together every 4 months or so for Vintage Cube, so some of it comes out of the binder sheet, as far as I know he rarely ever uses them for "regular" play, but he likes to use his Revised duals for EDH games. So If you're planning to go this deep, you'll probably need a lot of space, that's a lot of cardboard!
Another one of my friends likes to collect angels, and a third just has a knack for wizards, both of them keep them single-sleeved in a binder with 3x3 sheets, rarely, if at all do any of those see play.
Me? I just started collecting "2 Of's", think Glasses of urza and sunglasses of urza. About 2 weeks ago while playing EDH a guy mentioned Ante cards, I said as a joke I'd ante my glasses if he'd ante his sunglasses, and the next EDH session a friend gave me those as "just in case ante cards return" so that inspired me to start a collection. I now have in my collection UH and UG basics (One of each), Pyroblast, Red elemental Blast, Hydroblast & Blue elemental blast, basically anything that has a "sort of 2-of", in fact I just picked up a pair of flagbearers as there's only 2 of them. I'll probably just keep the whole theme going and move them to Two 2x2 binders once I stop collecting. I figure I'll probably use my cards, I've used the UG and UH basics for as long as I can remember (Own 5 of each) and, if I ever need any stuff from my collection I'll probably just grab it and put it back there once I'm done using it.
If you do intend to collect big, make sure you come up with a good organization method BEFORE collecting and stick to it. I did not and have been spending an ungodly amount of time trying to organize and catalog it. I go the extra mile where I sleeve everything, including tip cards and worthless commons. But...my brain says I MUST DO THIS! So I shall!
It's loads of fun though and I love it! In fact, we are looking for a new house and I want to make sure it has a bonus room in it, so I can get someone to make built-ins and whatnot for a special magic organization collection room. Much fun!!
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So my questions are how do I go about starting a collection? When I played pokemon and yu-gi-oh back in the day I had one of each card in my binder never to play with and then I have a box full of duplicates that I do play with. So when it comes to Magic should I just collect one of each card and put them in a binder and never play with them and the get a play set for when I do play or should I collect a play set to put in a binder and a play set to play with?
Also how should I store my collection? Binders, boxes, portfolios? If I collect play sets should i get a four pocket binder/portfolio like the dragon hide?
Thank you all for your time and your advice.
One of my closest friends has a really big collection, basically complete from Antiquities and onwards and only missing a couple of what he calls "the good stuff" and, well, a couple cards from ORI, BFZ and now OGW. He also owns a Full foil collection from all the core sets starting from 7th.
He has each expansion in a binder with 3x3 sheets and each card individually sleeved. In addition the room has humidity and temp control. The room has a pool/MTG table aswell, we get together every 4 months or so for Vintage Cube, so some of it comes out of the binder sheet, as far as I know he rarely ever uses them for "regular" play, but he likes to use his Revised duals for EDH games. So If you're planning to go this deep, you'll probably need a lot of space, that's a lot of cardboard!
Another one of my friends likes to collect angels, and a third just has a knack for wizards, both of them keep them single-sleeved in a binder with 3x3 sheets, rarely, if at all do any of those see play.
Me? I just started collecting "2 Of's", think Glasses of urza and sunglasses of urza. About 2 weeks ago while playing EDH a guy mentioned Ante cards, I said as a joke I'd ante my glasses if he'd ante his sunglasses, and the next EDH session a friend gave me those as "just in case ante cards return" so that inspired me to start a collection. I now have in my collection UH and UG basics (One of each), Pyroblast, Red elemental Blast, Hydroblast & Blue elemental blast, basically anything that has a "sort of 2-of", in fact I just picked up a pair of flagbearers as there's only 2 of them. I'll probably just keep the whole theme going and move them to Two 2x2 binders once I stop collecting. I figure I'll probably use my cards, I've used the UG and UH basics for as long as I can remember (Own 5 of each) and, if I ever need any stuff from my collection I'll probably just grab it and put it back there once I'm done using it.
Hope that helped.
A friend collects Monastary Swiftspear and has "thousands" of them.
The foil Monastary Swiftspear he has also in the hundreds.
A older friend collected Shivan Dragon and had like 5% of all Shivan Dragons from Summer Edition, which is a stupid amount of value ...
WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
👮👮👮 #BlueLivesMatter 👮👮👮
It's loads of fun though and I love it! In fact, we are looking for a new house and I want to make sure it has a bonus room in it, so I can get someone to make built-ins and whatnot for a special magic organization collection room. Much fun!!