I've pretty much scoured eBay and searched far and wide through Google, but all I'm getting are articles about PSA10 Black Lotuses. I can't seem to find a price on bad condition P9 cards. I have a friend's friend that wants to sell his Black Lotus and has pictures of it. It's definitely somewhere between PSA 1-1.5. Brown edges, fade cracks on the sides and a pretty faded vertical line. How much would you think it's worth?
This is probably not a whole lot of help, but here's a link to a pair of what SCG is selling what they view as MP ones for $4000, and they are light years better than this one. So, the best I could offer is "significantly less than $4000".
Damaged cards are usually at least 50% off the mint price. At the end of the day though, they are worth no more than what someone is willing to pay for them.
I love beat old cards. Some of my Forces are almost white bordered they have so much edge wear. Beta basics with shuffle creases are my jam.
However that Lotus just isn't worth it IMHO. You'll still probably pay several hundred dollars to almost a thousand possibly, and at that point of you can get a played UNL Mox in way better shape for that. To me if your end goal is just to have a Lotus, then I would imagine that this may be the cheapest one you'll ever get. But you'll probably never be able to recoup your money because the market for damaged cards is so small. Just some perspective to think about.
Has any judge ever commented on if it's still sleeve playable? It's kind of hard to tell from the pics. There is a small but eager market for playable beat power.
I wouldn't be sure on a card like that lotus ever being sleeve playable again. You might be able to make it sleeve playable, but I'm super skeptical. If it can be flattened to be sleeve playable with zero issues occurring like it marking the sleeve its in that just raises the value as there's a real market for beat playable power. I just sold a lotus a couple months ago for $2,125.00 as seen below with the back being extremely whitened to the point of making it hard to read the words magic the gathering and the front looked worse than what my scan tells you. Naturally I regret selling it since I had it personally signed by Christopher Rush at Vegas last year, but nothing to be done about it now short of me buying a signed lotus for far too much money. Halving the value of what my lotus sold for seems a reasonable price for a creased lotus. For it to go for less it would have to look way worse than it currently does.
I think $1,000 is what it's worth to the right person who wants to buy it. You could easily sell a torn in half unlimited lotus for $500 I bet especially in the wake of Christopher Rush's unfortunate passing to a dealer like Dan Bock. This card isn't torn in half, so that adds a lot of value despite it still not being all that great. I just cashed out of MTG and would put forward $500 for that lotus in a heartbeat (not soliciting here mods.) Lotus is the most collectable card in magic history and that's worth something. The best thing about this lotus is that no one will ever think it's counterfeit short of you finding the most paranoid person on the planet.
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I love beat old cards. Some of my Forces are almost white bordered they have so much edge wear. Beta basics with shuffle creases are my jam.
However that Lotus just isn't worth it IMHO. You'll still probably pay several hundred dollars to almost a thousand possibly, and at that point of you can get a played UNL Mox in way better shape for that. To me if your end goal is just to have a Lotus, then I would imagine that this may be the cheapest one you'll ever get. But you'll probably never be able to recoup your money because the market for damaged cards is so small. Just some perspective to think about.
A lot of people want a Black Lotus, Collector's Edition ones sell for up to $500. A real one, albeit really damaged is easily worth at least $1000 even if not tournament playable.
I agree with the previous posters. It's worth whatever a person wants to buy it for. 1000$ seems fair, considering the condition and all.
I always found myself drawn to Power that's a bit played rather and NM, if only for counterfeit issues. I mean, I can tell the real deal from the fake when I have the card in hand and all. But I don't know, a card that age that's absolutely perfect feels a bit weird. I passed on a Walk for that reason a few years ago. Just my 2 cents.
Speaking as someone who has purchased Lotuses recently, I give you the following things people in the lotus market will consider.
1. A NM Collectors edition lotus can be had for 500.
2. Because a NM collectors edition is tournament unplayable, your lotus has a lower bound of $500.
3. Then, if you had to pay for a tournament unplayable lotus for 500, would you then pick a replica edition or the original one.
4. I believe many would pick the original in that case. All things being equal--two tournament unplayable lotuses, it still better to have a real one.
500 dollars constitutes in a sense an absolute lower bound.
Now let's go for higher valuations.
Is your Lotus sleeve playable in the tournament? This is not impossible, but you have to convince people that it is. I can't tell you what will or will not be sleeve playable, but I can tell you as a reasonable person that a lotus that isn't even flat will not be sleeve playable.
Next, is there any question as to the authenticity of the lotus?
Finally, is there any reason to question the integrity of the seller?
Assuming everything is legit, and that you manage to get the card in sleeve playable condition, you should be able to pull at least 1000 for the lotus in my opinion. I would even say 1500 is possible, especially if you lock that in a BGS sleeve to prove authenticity.
However, I know this wasnt the point of the question but I have to say it. When I look at that lotus, something looks suspect. I can't tell because the photo isnt that clear but the wear on the back side and wear on the front side look totally misaligned. That's red flag #1.
Additionally, the card creases look completely unnatural. It looks like a kid took the card and crumpled the card in his hand. Look at how deep those creases are. That kind of wear is once again incredibly weird looking. All of you here, I challenge you with this question as fellow magic players. How many times in your life have you crushed a magic card so that it would have the shape of the creases on this card. I think i have crushed maybe 10 cards in my life?
Its just a very odd thing to happen to a magic card. It certainly does not happen from normal play. The creases are red flag #2.
Furthermore, the card is not flat. Why is the card not flat? Not only is it not flat, the card is bumpy in multiple ways. There are several bumps on the card. Again, this does not happen in normal play. It means that the card wear got there from being crushed. It sounds like I'm repeating myself, but there is a subtle point to be made. The fact there there are multiple bumps means that the card was deliberately crushed as opposed to being unintentionally crushed.
Intentional crushing is red flag #3
Furthermore, there are TWO cards that are like this. Two cards with the same crush marks that are not flat, but bumpy in various ways. I once again challenge the magic community and ask them, when have you ever crushed two cards side by side. The lotus by itself is rare enough, but the mox really raises a red flag.
Consider that red flag #4. This is a red flag that would not occur if only the lotus appeared in the pic, or only the mox appeared in the pic. This is the kind of red flag that appears because it shows a suspicious flag occur twice in a row.
Finally, why is there diagonal wear on the mox ruby? The diagonal wear on the upper right quadrant of the card has very even 45 degree lines running in parallel with each other. Have you ever played with magic cards unsleeved? I have. You have too? Good. So tell me, under what conditions are you going to get a card with parallel diagonal wear lines. Answer: Never.
There is too much surface scratching in one way, and the wear is too consistent for too large a part of the card. Therefore the parallel wear lines on the mox ruby did not occur from sidewalk playing. It occurred in some other way--like sandpaper. This is red flag #5.
Red flag #6 is a meta red flag. it is a red flag that occurs when too many red flags of the same kind occur. In this case, too many red flags which show deliberate wear that is not consistent with normal playing habits. Therefore, if it were me, i would stay away.
I don't see any red flags from the admittedly not great pictures in looking at the lotus. For a card to be that beat up it's obvious people played it unsleeved. A lot. Same with almost all pieces of power that they were played unsleeved and anything can happen to a card when it's unsleeved. It could have gotten stored poorly. Any number of things could have happened to it over 23 years. I wouldn't factor in the mox ruby in verifying the authenticity of a piece of power next to it even if the mox ruby is fake it proves nothing about the lotus short of knowing the entire history of the cards in question. I suspect it we tore test that lotus it would be real, but naturally I advise against that unless NO ONE will buy it, period.
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I don't see any red flags from the admittedly not great pictures in looking at the lotus. For a card to be that beat up it's obvious people played it unsleeved. A lot. Same with almost all pieces of power that they were played unsleeved and anything can happen to a card when it's unsleeved. It could have gotten stored poorly. Any number of things could have happened to it over 23 years. I wouldn't factor in the mox ruby in verifying the authenticity of a piece of power next to it even if the mox ruby is fake it proves nothing about the lotus short of knowing the entire history of the cards in question. I suspect it we tore test that lotus it would be real, but naturally I advise against that unless NO ONE will buy it, period.
Could an unsleeved card get bends like that? Sure. Let's say I admit I'm wrong and that I failed to prove the cards are fake.
Are you now imbued with confidence the cards are real because you established a possibility? Because unsleeved cards could get like that?
That's the thing. The burden isn't on the buyer to prove that the card is fake. It's on the seller to prove the cards are real.
The seller COULD put the burden on the buyer, but the seller is going to get less money that way.
It's possible that cards could end up with a strange crumple pattern like that. But the point isn't that it could end up that way. Nor is the point whether the card is fake or not.
It's impossible to tell for certain from the blurry pics after all.
The point is that that crumple pattern is outright weird, even for a heavily played card.
Here's the thing about being right and wrong when it comes to the market though. Let's say you disagree with me: TomCat doesn't know what he is talking about, that kind of crumple pattern happens all the time!
If you are correct, then theoretically you have information superior to my information, and you could trade on it. You could pick up all the lotuses with crumple patterns I consider weird and pick up lotuses at superior bargains to me. I'm not touching those lotuses with a 10 foot pole. But because of my recalcitrance, it could be to your benefit.
When it comes time to sell lotuses, if the rest of the market agrees with you, and say Bread was right. They will say the following: those crumples are really common, so I can buy those lotuses confidently from Bread.
But if they disagree with you, and assert. Oh man, maybe Tomcat has a point. Those lotuses are weird. They will not purchase from you from the level you valued it at.
The thing in all that rigamorale was this. Whether those lotuses were actually real or not didnt even play into the equation. It was all about the perceptions. And Vintage is a small enough market where the perceptions of your buyers matter.
Edit: I wanted to comment on the last bit, because it's a great point I've come to learn from the Vintage market. Everyone's opinions matter.
In stocks you can be the contrarian and think everyone is an idiot for the market mispricing. But for super low liquidity markets such as Vintage, if market participants only valued lotuses with pink hearts on them, don't buy a lotus without a pink heart if liquidating your lotus is important to you in the future.
It should be pretty easy to check the authenticity. I agree that the wear seems bit unnatural, but it's not rebacked card, as CE-cards are black bordered, so the card is either real or a fake with lot of mishandling done to it, to cover the fakeness.
So ask for a 600 dpi scan of the card and check if the card is real. Remember to check both sides and see if the normal problems are there. Naturally the last test is handling the card, most fakes feel off. Just remember that the stiffness of the card will most likely be pretty much destroyed by the wear.
I wouldn't buy that one, not at 500 or even at 200, as it will only be playable Philippines-style, all cards in top loaders. :)(Does anybody else remember the pics from Tan, where players had these 30 inch piles of top loaders next to them in tournaments...)
Thanks for all the feedback. I will definitely be able to take a look at these cards in person and will be able to handle them before nay money is exchanged. It definitely seemed like this was owned by a kid was back when it first came out and crumpled it. Then sat in a showbox for a while then when it was found, put in a screwcase where it sat even more, possibly got flooded then dried because of the rusted screw. But I'll definitely take all your words to heart and thanks again!
Thanks for all the feedback. I will definitely be able to take a look at these cards in person and will be able to handle them before nay money is exchanged. It definitely seemed like this was owned by a kid was back when it first came out and crumpled it. Then sat in a showbox for a while then when it was found, put in a screwcase where it sat even more, possibly got flooded then dried because of the rusted screw. But I'll definitely take all your words to heart and thanks again!
Remember, damage on old cards can be ridiculous. There's an anecdote about how one of the original playtesters, Charlie Catino, used to physically destroy decks created by another playtester, Skaff Elias. The most egregious that I can recall is that one deck went into a BLENDER. People did WEIRD things to their cards back then. I'm sure I wasn't the only kid who put them in his bicycle spokes, because that's what my dad did with his baseball cards.
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I know my little brother put a pokemon card I had back in the day through a fan going full speed and it ****ed it up. I don't know the location of that card but it wouldn't surprise me if it was similar to the lotus in terms of bends/damage.
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http://imgur.com/06miC8Q
http://sales.starcitygames.com/carddisplay.php?product=1161480
http://sales.starcitygames.com/carddisplay.php?product=1161479
Might want to check ebay too, there are much better condition ones with Buy it Now's of $2900 http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-Black-Lotus-98-Unlimited-PowerNine-Artifact-Rare-P9-Power9-MtG-Magic-/361360853886?hash=item5422c90b7e:g:A3QAAOSwPcVVyReq
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-Black-Lotus-77-Unlimited-PowerNine-Artifact-Rare-P9-Power9-MtG-Magic-/381358024751?hash=item58cab5a82f:g:nUoAAOSw~gRVyCeC
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However that Lotus just isn't worth it IMHO. You'll still probably pay several hundred dollars to almost a thousand possibly, and at that point of you can get a played UNL Mox in way better shape for that. To me if your end goal is just to have a Lotus, then I would imagine that this may be the cheapest one you'll ever get. But you'll probably never be able to recoup your money because the market for damaged cards is so small. Just some perspective to think about.
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I'd love to own a beat lotus like that though, just for the story.
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$500 would be a steal. Any real lotus that isn't ripped in half is worth at least $1000.
I think $1,000 is what it's worth to the right person who wants to buy it. You could easily sell a torn in half unlimited lotus for $500 I bet especially in the wake of Christopher Rush's unfortunate passing to a dealer like Dan Bock. This card isn't torn in half, so that adds a lot of value despite it still not being all that great. I just cashed out of MTG and would put forward $500 for that lotus in a heartbeat (not soliciting here mods.) Lotus is the most collectable card in magic history and that's worth something. The best thing about this lotus is that no one will ever think it's counterfeit short of you finding the most paranoid person on the planet.
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A lot of people want a Black Lotus, Collector's Edition ones sell for up to $500. A real one, albeit really damaged is easily worth at least $1000 even if not tournament playable.
I always found myself drawn to Power that's a bit played rather and NM, if only for counterfeit issues. I mean, I can tell the real deal from the fake when I have the card in hand and all. But I don't know, a card that age that's absolutely perfect feels a bit weird. I passed on a Walk for that reason a few years ago. Just my 2 cents.
1. A NM Collectors edition lotus can be had for 500.
2. Because a NM collectors edition is tournament unplayable, your lotus has a lower bound of $500.
3. Then, if you had to pay for a tournament unplayable lotus for 500, would you then pick a replica edition or the original one.
4. I believe many would pick the original in that case. All things being equal--two tournament unplayable lotuses, it still better to have a real one.
500 dollars constitutes in a sense an absolute lower bound.
Now let's go for higher valuations.
Is your Lotus sleeve playable in the tournament? This is not impossible, but you have to convince people that it is. I can't tell you what will or will not be sleeve playable, but I can tell you as a reasonable person that a lotus that isn't even flat will not be sleeve playable.
Next, is there any question as to the authenticity of the lotus?
Finally, is there any reason to question the integrity of the seller?
Assuming everything is legit, and that you manage to get the card in sleeve playable condition, you should be able to pull at least 1000 for the lotus in my opinion. I would even say 1500 is possible, especially if you lock that in a BGS sleeve to prove authenticity.
However, I know this wasnt the point of the question but I have to say it. When I look at that lotus, something looks suspect. I can't tell because the photo isnt that clear but the wear on the back side and wear on the front side look totally misaligned. That's red flag #1.
Additionally, the card creases look completely unnatural. It looks like a kid took the card and crumpled the card in his hand. Look at how deep those creases are. That kind of wear is once again incredibly weird looking. All of you here, I challenge you with this question as fellow magic players. How many times in your life have you crushed a magic card so that it would have the shape of the creases on this card. I think i have crushed maybe 10 cards in my life?
Its just a very odd thing to happen to a magic card. It certainly does not happen from normal play. The creases are red flag #2.
Furthermore, the card is not flat. Why is the card not flat? Not only is it not flat, the card is bumpy in multiple ways. There are several bumps on the card. Again, this does not happen in normal play. It means that the card wear got there from being crushed. It sounds like I'm repeating myself, but there is a subtle point to be made. The fact there there are multiple bumps means that the card was deliberately crushed as opposed to being unintentionally crushed.
Intentional crushing is red flag #3
Furthermore, there are TWO cards that are like this. Two cards with the same crush marks that are not flat, but bumpy in various ways. I once again challenge the magic community and ask them, when have you ever crushed two cards side by side. The lotus by itself is rare enough, but the mox really raises a red flag.
Consider that red flag #4. This is a red flag that would not occur if only the lotus appeared in the pic, or only the mox appeared in the pic. This is the kind of red flag that appears because it shows a suspicious flag occur twice in a row.
Finally, why is there diagonal wear on the mox ruby? The diagonal wear on the upper right quadrant of the card has very even 45 degree lines running in parallel with each other. Have you ever played with magic cards unsleeved? I have. You have too? Good. So tell me, under what conditions are you going to get a card with parallel diagonal wear lines. Answer: Never.
There is too much surface scratching in one way, and the wear is too consistent for too large a part of the card. Therefore the parallel wear lines on the mox ruby did not occur from sidewalk playing. It occurred in some other way--like sandpaper. This is red flag #5.
Red flag #6 is a meta red flag. it is a red flag that occurs when too many red flags of the same kind occur. In this case, too many red flags which show deliberate wear that is not consistent with normal playing habits. Therefore, if it were me, i would stay away.
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Could an unsleeved card get bends like that? Sure. Let's say I admit I'm wrong and that I failed to prove the cards are fake.
Are you now imbued with confidence the cards are real because you established a possibility? Because unsleeved cards could get like that?
That's the thing. The burden isn't on the buyer to prove that the card is fake. It's on the seller to prove the cards are real.
The seller COULD put the burden on the buyer, but the seller is going to get less money that way.
It's possible that cards could end up with a strange crumple pattern like that. But the point isn't that it could end up that way. Nor is the point whether the card is fake or not.
It's impossible to tell for certain from the blurry pics after all.
The point is that that crumple pattern is outright weird, even for a heavily played card.
Here's the thing about being right and wrong when it comes to the market though. Let's say you disagree with me: TomCat doesn't know what he is talking about, that kind of crumple pattern happens all the time!
If you are correct, then theoretically you have information superior to my information, and you could trade on it. You could pick up all the lotuses with crumple patterns I consider weird and pick up lotuses at superior bargains to me. I'm not touching those lotuses with a 10 foot pole. But because of my recalcitrance, it could be to your benefit.
When it comes time to sell lotuses, if the rest of the market agrees with you, and say Bread was right. They will say the following: those crumples are really common, so I can buy those lotuses confidently from Bread.
But if they disagree with you, and assert. Oh man, maybe Tomcat has a point. Those lotuses are weird. They will not purchase from you from the level you valued it at.
The thing in all that rigamorale was this. Whether those lotuses were actually real or not didnt even play into the equation. It was all about the perceptions. And Vintage is a small enough market where the perceptions of your buyers matter.
Edit: I wanted to comment on the last bit, because it's a great point I've come to learn from the Vintage market. Everyone's opinions matter.
In stocks you can be the contrarian and think everyone is an idiot for the market mispricing. But for super low liquidity markets such as Vintage, if market participants only valued lotuses with pink hearts on them, don't buy a lotus without a pink heart if liquidating your lotus is important to you in the future.
So ask for a 600 dpi scan of the card and check if the card is real. Remember to check both sides and see if the normal problems are there. Naturally the last test is handling the card, most fakes feel off. Just remember that the stiffness of the card will most likely be pretty much destroyed by the wear.
I wouldn't buy that one, not at 500 or even at 200, as it will only be playable Philippines-style, all cards in top loaders. :)(Does anybody else remember the pics from Tan, where players had these 30 inch piles of top loaders next to them in tournaments...)
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Remember, damage on old cards can be ridiculous. There's an anecdote about how one of the original playtesters, Charlie Catino, used to physically destroy decks created by another playtester, Skaff Elias. The most egregious that I can recall is that one deck went into a BLENDER. People did WEIRD things to their cards back then. I'm sure I wasn't the only kid who put them in his bicycle spokes, because that's what my dad did with his baseball cards.
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