New to these forums, and not sure if this is an annoying thing to post, so please forgive me if it is!
I came across a seller who's looking to sell a Beta Chaos Orb, and I'm debating a) whether it's worth purchasing and b) whether it's authentic.
For a little background, I just collect old cards for fun at this point. I started playing at Revised through the late 90s, still have my old collection, and have had fun buying small collections and sorting / categorizing them. I'm not buying to make money, but I'm also not buying to lose it. I know Chaos Orb is only playable in 93/94, so I'm not sure how interesting it is to collectors.
I haven't had a chance to check it out in person yet, but I've read up on what kind of tests I should do (light, UV, dot patterns, etc.). The attached pics show dot patterns that look authentic based on my research, and the coard itself has the white corners and 2-shaded black borders which suggest to me that it is likely real. The seller also says that they won this card in a small tournament in the mid 90s, for what it's worth. Additionally, I'm not sure whether anyone would fake this card, given it's limited playability. I know these pics aren't great, but if anyone has any advice or idea based on the pictures, I'd be indebted. If I go to take a look at it, I'll try some of the tests and compare to a few common Betas I have, but I'd hate to be way off in my assessment.
Price wise, I think I am hoping to get it for around $400. It's hard to tell what this card is going for online, but given that it's lower than buy list, that seems reasonable. I'm curious whether other folks would think it's worth buying for collecting purposes, and whether $400 is reasonable or not given the unique nature of the card.
Anyway, apologies again for newly joining and immediately asking for help - any advice would be much appreciated. Looking forward to participating in the community more now that I've rekindled my interest in magic!
Also... Unsure of whether this is alpha or beta. Corners look more like alpha now that I've looked at it more closely.
Hi ekgregory, and welcome to MTGS!
So, first things first. Thank you for posting pictures. I can't verify the veracity of the Orb over the internet - for a card like this, you're going to want to physically inspect it with a loupe, and maybe take it to a trusted dealer. As much as I'd love to be able to authenticate remotely, there's just too much wiggle room.
Second thing, yeah, those do look like Alpha corners.
Third thing: While Chaos Orb is kind of a "random" card, it is quite good in 93/94, as it's gotten format-specific errata to skip the flipping and simply blow up any card. So there is real demand for it again, and it's probably seeing more play than it ever did back in the day. It's also quite iconic (and strikingly illustrated).
Fourth thing: the Reserve list. WOTC has promised that they will never ever print Chaos Orb (among other cards) again. That's led to some serious market-cornering and price-gouging by people who've thought "Well, I can buy up ALL of the copies of this card, and charge whatever I want". UL Chaos Orbs are currently $500 on TCGp, so if this is an Alpha and not a damaged Beta, you're going to be looking at a cool grand, easy.
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Thanks for the welcome, and for the detailed response! I really appreciate your insights. I ordered a loupe, blacklight, and a few other tools so I can do an initial look - I'll also poke around for a dealer nearby the location. Totally makes sense that it's not possible to verify anything online off of lousy pictures. Smile
Thanks so much for the insights on the card itself as well - it is just an iconic card as you said; for some reason it's been one of my favorites since I was a kid. Didn't realize you don't have to flip it anymore.
I didn't realize market-cornering was this wide-spread - that would explain why the prices seem so off (Beta higher than Alpha, etc.). Really appreciate the insight into the value - if I can verify that it's authentic, I'd definitely love to purchase it for <$500.
I'm hoping to check it out in person this weekend, so I will follow up on this thread in case anyone's interested in how it turns out. Thank you again! Really appreciate it. I'll start reading up on the forums so I can contribute to the community.
Thanks for the welcome, and for the detailed response! I really appreciate your insights. I ordered a loupe, blacklight, and a few other tools so I can do an initial look - I'll also poke around for a dealer nearby the location. Totally makes sense that it's not possible to verify anything online off of lousy pictures. Smile
Thanks so much for the insights on the card itself as well - it is just an iconic card as you said; for some reason it's been one of my favorites since I was a kid. Didn't realize you don't have to flip it anymore.
I didn't realize market-cornering was this wide-spread - that would explain why the prices seem so off (Beta higher than Alpha, etc.). Really appreciate the insight into the value - if I can verify that it's authentic, I'd definitely love to purchase it for <$500.
I'm hoping to check it out in person this weekend, so I will follow up on this thread in case anyone's interested in how it turns out. Thank you again! Really appreciate it. I'll start reading up on the forums so I can contribute to the community.
I have always loved Chaos Orb, and I've wanted one forever. That aside, I'm always interested in big deals going down - do tell us how it goes. Is it real? Does the seller know what he's got? Does he name a price that's firm that leaves you shaken and wondering who would part with that much money for a simple (yet gorgeous) piece of cardboard? These are the stories of our people, the tales swapped over the fire. Of COURSE you should tell us what happens.
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Will do! Your rallying cry has me eager to see where this all ends up. Thanks again.
Agreed - that's why my skepticism is raised. He's been asking a lot more but dropped it down to around $500 a few months ago. We'll see how it ends up.
Update here - I ended up buying it! Confirmed that the card has Alpha corners. I ran a bunch of tests (visual inspection for color, jeweler's loupe for dot patterns and edge inspection, light test to see the back shine through the card, blacklight, bend test, and water test) and they all passed. The seller also was a long time magic player, with tons of cards from Revised on, and said that he won it in a raffle for tournament winners from a local store. Based off of my inspection + testing and his story, I am pretty confident that it's authentic.
I've attached 600 DPI scans of the front and back next to a couple other Alphas I have for comparison - unfortunately I don't have a higher DPI printer. The card is really pretty - great colors on the art, which is what originally drew me to it.
More info for others interested:
Where I found it: I found the card advertised on Facebook listed for $510, ignored it for a while thinking it was too good to be true / out of my price range, then finally reached out to the seller last week. Drove to meet him this weekend - really nice guy, longtime player, knew what he had but didn't seem interested in selling online. He was interested in trading for part of the value so I brought my binders of old cards.
Price: We agreed on $330 plus a trade - I received the Chaos Orb and a Revised Mana Vault, and he got 1x Unlimited Vesuvan Doppleganger, 2x Tormet Cabal Coffers, 2x Serra Angels (1 Unlimited, 1 Revised), 2x Revised Royal Assassins, and a few other mid-90s rares worth a few bucks. All in all, that feels like around $400 in value from me, although I'm probably over-valuing my cards' worth in the trade. I was honest with him about being a casual collector and that he could get more online, but he was fine with that and interested in adding to his collection as well.
Card condition: The card is in pretty good shape overall - corners and edges show a little wear, but the surfaces are good, centering seems good to my untrained eye. The colors are really vibrant, which is great. You can see the little white triangles and two-tone black borders which Alpha / Beta have. The corner wear worried me a bit because I was worried the edges were cut to resemble Alpha, but the wear is consistent with the Alpha commons I have, and they look good under the loupe.
Happy to answer questions if anyone has any! This was a fun experience in the end - I was really stressed that the card would be fake and the negotiations would be tough but it was a fun experience overall, and I learned a lot along the way.
A few questions I have, if anyone has any advice:
Best way to store it: I have it in a perfect fit sleeve right now - I was thinking of putting that in a ultra-pro one touch. Anyone have any other recommendations for taking care of older cards? Any other things I should do to protect it?
Good buy?: I am both really excited I bought it but also kind of stressed that I spent that much cash on a piece of cardboard and traded a few old cards I liked for it. I am telling myself I got a really good deal - let me know if you agree / disagree!
What's it actually worth?: I feel like given all the market movements it's impossible to actually know it's value. Is $1000 in the ballpark? Not planning on selling but it'd be cool to know just for my own benefit. I only found 2 auctions for it on eBay with outrageous prices.
Grading: From my research online, it sounds like grading is only worth it when the card is mint - I don't think this one is, based on the edge weaqr. Is that correct?
Did people really rip these up and throw the pieces on the table, or is that a myth?
Best way to store it: I have it in a perfect fit sleeve right now - I was thinking of putting that in a ultra-pro one touch. Anyone have any other recommendations for taking care of older cards? Any other things I should do to protect it?
Good buy?: I am both really excited I bought it but also kind of stressed that I spent that much cash on a piece of cardboard and traded a few old cards I liked for it. I am telling myself I got a really good deal - let me know if you agree / disagree!
What's it actually worth?: I feel like given all the market movements it's impossible to actually know it's value. Is $1000 in the ballpark? Not planning on selling but it'd be cool to know just for my own benefit. I only found 2 auctions for it on eBay with outrageous prices.
Grading: From my research online, it sounds like grading is only worth it when the card is mint - I don't think this one is, based on the edge weaqr. Is that correct?
Did people really rip these up and throw the pieces on the table, or is that a myth?
I have my Orb in a perfect fit, in a regular sleeve, in a binder in a fire safe. I'm looking into Perfect Hards; they seem to be a "better" option than just perfects, because of a slight increase in protection against accidental bending, but honestly I never take it out of the binder, so it's probably fine.
It was a great buy. You are definitely overvaluing your cards. Heck, if you'd given him an UL USea, I would've called it a fair trade - there are only 1100 of these in existence!
You are correct in saying that it's impossible to know the exact price. A LP Alpha Orb sold on eBay last month for about $1.2k. Two others sold for best offers since then, probably for similar amounts. So that's around where I'd peg the value.
Grading is "worth it" if you can get a 10. You can't get a 10, so I wouldn't bother.
No, ripping them up was just an urban legend. Although some of the WOTC playtesters were brutal (decks went in blenders, and got glued together).
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Once again, thank you so much for the answers, advice, and insights. I definitely would not have bought this without your advice and the insights I got from searching the forums, so I'm looking forward participating more and hopefully helping others as well. And I'll check out the hards - didn't realize they had another option. Thanks again!
Once again, thank you so much for the answers, advice, and insights. I definitely would not have bought this without your advice and the insights I got from searching the forums, so I'm looking forward participating more and hopefully helping others as well. And I'll check out the hards - didn't realize they had another option. Thanks again!
You're quite welcome. Glad we were able to be of assistance.
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I wasn't going to say anything but this really needs to be straightened out....
You really shouldn't do the bend test anymore. It's a load of bunk and it doesn't tell you what you think it does.
All Magic cards are made from paper stock. Paper fibers. These fibers have the finite ability to flex with minute traces of fibers breaking each time you bend the card this way.
This is like having a spindown counter on the card with no way to add more and you have no idea what the current count is. Each bend knocks the count down by one until one day, crack!, the card is done.
On another note, if the card is so ****ty that it will crack under the bend test, it won't pass the light test or even the eyeball test. If the card is good enough that it passes the tests noted above, it'll pass the bend test.
So please, don't do the bend test. File it away amongst the other old garbage tests like the squeak test. It's just not worth the risk.
Sorry for the delay. Thank you for the insight on the bend test - that makes total sense to me! My lack of experience combined with my paranoia about buying a fake card meant that I just got a list of tests I could find on forums together to run when I looked at the card. Makes sense that this one wouldn't be helpful if the other tests are passed - really appreciate your advice!
On a separate note, I had no idea there was a squeak test!
Oh buddy. Im not sure if I should say anything. I honestly hope I'm wrong for your sake, but it looks fake to me.
And I honestly hope someone on this forum shuts me down and argues convincingly I'm full of BS.
But here we go.
1) I'm sorry to say but the people on this forum just don't know enough when it comes to alpha, beta, unlimted, and revised.
Goto high end magic on facebook.
2) Yes the bend test is bunk. Yes the rosette aka the dot test is one of the best tests. Yes your alpha chaos orb has the white dots in the corners. But if your card is a rebacked card, it's going to pass all those tests. If you didnt' know a rebacked card is a card from which MTG collectors edition(CE) cards were used and glued to the back of real magic cards. In short, people sand down the CE card's back. They sand down the real card's front, and glue the two cards together. Rebacked cards pass the rosette test and the little white corner test because CE cards are real magic cards!!!
3)Your card is too shiny. Far too shiny. Real beta and alpha cards don't have the sheen that later mtg cards did. Collectors edition however came out later. Much later than alpha beta. The front of the CE cards almost feel like a nice magazine. In contrast real alpha beta cards were almost rough to the touch. They were matte, not shiny.
That looks like a real alpha to me. The sheen is completely consistent with what I know of alpha. In contrast, your initial pics show highly reflective sheen indicating a glossy surface.
Your 600dpi scan wasn't enough to reveal the rosette pattern, but like I said, if we're dealing with CE, that's not going to matter.
4) Finally, the biggest red flag was that you picked it up for 400. Honestly, looking at recent alpha chaos orbs having sold online, the going market rate was 4000, not 400 around the time you picked up yours. If you really picked up an alpha chaos orb for 10 times less than the going rate, it would mean that the guy who sold it to you just couldnt be bothered to be notified that he could have gotten 3600 more for it. In this day and age, you should always presume people know the worth of what they are selling.
Again, I truly hope for your sake I'm wrong. But you asked for our advice, and that's my opinion given what I see.
Edited:
You know what, here is a way to prove me right or wrong. Take a look at your other cards. Im assuming the rebacker didnt reback the false orders or ironwood treefolk. with clean dry hands touch the face of the card. The sheen on your commons should reveal to you what real alpha feels like. If your alpha chaos orb feels the same, ur good. If not, something is amiss.
Oh buddy. Im not sure if I should say anything. I honestly hope I'm wrong for your sake, but it looks fake to me.
And I honestly hope someone on this forum shuts me down and argues convincingly I'm full of BS.
...
Edited:
You know what, here is a way to prove me right or wrong. Take a look at your other cards. Im assuming the rebacker didnt reback the false orders or ironwood treefolk. with clean dry hands touch the face of the card. The sheen on your commons should reveal to you what real alpha feels like. If your alpha chaos orb feels the same, ur good. If not, something is amiss.
Hi NierAutomata,
Thanks for your thoughtful post and information, I do really appreciate it as I'm still learning. I'll respond to your numbered points below with some additional info in case you have any additional thoughts - sorry for the lengthy response. Again, thanks for your time and no worries about being the bearer of bad news, I get that it's risky to spend hundreds of dollars on old cardboard.
I bought this with eyes wide open on the risk of it being fake, and obviously the analysis I performed when I bought it and now is based on my own limited + subjective experience. I tried to treat it as a fake card to start and perform each test I knew / read about as I went to see if that hypothesis could be proven wrong. So it definitely could still be fake even after my new analysis (which I performed at your recommendation).
TL;DR: I tested the sheen of each card and attached pics to show how they reflect light. As far as I can tell, the all feel the same (rough) and look textured / matte / rough in the same light. Price is a longer explanation below but I agree that it was a red flag.
1) Thanks, will check that out!
2) Thanks for the additional info on re-backed cards, I read up a bunch about them before I checked out this card and it seemed to me the most likely type of fake I could encounter.
2) So the pictures I posted initially were from the seller's cell phone pics posted on FB, before I bought the card. They are horrible pictures and look really shiny - I was really worried about them heading into the potential sale. The Treefolk and False Orders are my own cards bought from Card Kingdom, not the sellers'. I brought them with me to compare when I looked at the card and ultimately bought it.
Based off of your suggestion, today I took the three cards out of their sleeves, closed my eyes, mixed them up in my hands, and felt the sheen on each. I couldn't tell the difference, using every finger and method of feeling the surface. They definitely don't feel like a glossy magazine - each of them feels rough, and in the light they look almost textured due to the matte surface. I tried to capture that in the photos I attached to show that they reflect light in the same matte, textured way - I'd love to know if you have any additional thoughts from those photos. To me they feel the same and the surface looks the same at all angles of light. I would hope that if the card was rebacked and had a CE front that the surface would be relatively easy to notice a difference on, but please let me know if that's not the case. Maybe I should buy a cheap one to compare it to?
And unfortunately I don't have a high DPI scanner, so 600 was the best I could do.
4) Agreed on the price being a red flag - this had too good to be true written all over it. Mtggoldfish had the Alpha price at $1,200 for this card when I checked it out - I checked, but remember because I was obsessively checking it to try and figure out why it was so cheap. Seller only posted it on FB Marketplace, had it listed for months at $800 (which I saw and ignored for a while thinking it was too good to be true) then dropped it to $540 a few weeks before I reached out. It was not cross-listed anywhere else online that I could find and it had no description in the post other than the title - "Chaos Orb card". My warning flags were all going off, but I reached out to kick the tires and ended up talking to him on the phone. I drove over an hour out to his place to check out the card and the whole way was telling myself I'd be wasting a day of my time.
Anyway, I went out there, did my tests, and ended up spending a couple hours with him talking about magic, how he used to play a lot in the 90s, looking through his other cards, and him looking through mine (which he asked if I could bring out). It was sort of weird, but he just handed me the card very nonchalantly and asked if he could look through mine; when I asked if I could run my tests on it he said absolutely and seemed completely uninterested in it - he was definitely not anxious.
I asked him a lot of questions because I was still nervous about the whole thing. I mentioned it above, but he said he won the card in a small local tournament raffle in the 90s (which both reassured me and made me suspicious because I am paranoid). This was the only Alpha card heh had. He had decks and decks of mid-90s cards (lots of Urza's block, etc.) that were mostly unsleeved and well played, haphazardly kept in beat up old boxes, and I'm sure there was a lot of valuable stuff in there. He just handed stacks to me and asked if I awas interested in anything.
After I ran my tests, when we got to discussing price (which was over an hour into the whole thing) I told him he could definitely get a lot more than what could offer on on eBay or at an online store. At the time I had seen the $1200 figure online but it really wasn't clear to me what the card would actually go for, and it's not mint. Based off of his responses, it was apparent that he just really wasn't a technology guy, didn't know how to use eBay and didn't want to put in the time, and didn't want to ship off his cards or deal with a store (he doesn't trust them). He lived pretty far out from the city and any card store, so he wasn't super mobile.
He was really eager to trade for some old cards of mine, and didn't seem super anxious to sell the card to me or concerned if I didn't want it - he said he just didn't need it and would rather get something for it and get some new cards. He didn't know what the value was of a lot of my cards he picked, so he was surprised when I told him some of the Unlimited stuff he wanted had some value (Serra Angel, Vesuvan Doppleganger, etc.). It was sort of weird / difficult to negotiate the sale with him because he clearly knew more about all the old cards he had than me, really wanted to trade, but hadn't done a lot of research online about any of hte card values. I offered him $300 plus the cards I mentioned earlier in the thread and he countered at $350 - we settled on $330. As I left, he offered to meet up and play if I ever wanted to.
As you said, you should presume that he knew how much the card was worth, but there was also part of me that was worried that I was taking advantage of him, which is why I told him I knew he could get more elsewhere. I walked away feeling like he was happy with the deal and obviously on my end, if it's real it's a great deal.
So - all this being said, I'd love to know if you still really think it's a fake, and I'd be curious to know if you think I should bring it to a shop or try to have it graded. I still feel like it's real based on few hours of tests and examining it I've done now that I've bought it, but I am obviously biased and new to this, and did my best with the tests / knowledge / data I had. It would be a huge bummer if it isn't, but overall I'm at peace with it as I knew the risks going in.
The good news is, I bought one of the giant blown up Chaos Orb cards on eBay for $10, and I know that one is definitely real haha.
New to these forums, and not sure if this is an annoying thing to post, so please forgive me if it is!
I came across a seller who's looking to sell a Beta Chaos Orb, and I'm debating a) whether it's worth purchasing and b) whether it's authentic.
For a little background, I just collect old cards for fun at this point. I started playing at Revised through the late 90s, still have my old collection, and have had fun buying small collections and sorting / categorizing them. I'm not buying to make money, but I'm also not buying to lose it. I know Chaos Orb is only playable in 93/94, so I'm not sure how interesting it is to collectors.
I haven't had a chance to check it out in person yet, but I've read up on what kind of tests I should do (light, UV, dot patterns, etc.). The attached pics show dot patterns that look authentic based on my research, and the coard itself has the white corners and 2-shaded black borders which suggest to me that it is likely real. The seller also says that they won this card in a small tournament in the mid 90s, for what it's worth. Additionally, I'm not sure whether anyone would fake this card, given it's limited playability. I know these pics aren't great, but if anyone has any advice or idea based on the pictures, I'd be indebted. If I go to take a look at it, I'll try some of the tests and compare to a few common Betas I have, but I'd hate to be way off in my assessment.
Price wise, I think I am hoping to get it for around $400. It's hard to tell what this card is going for online, but given that it's lower than buy list, that seems reasonable. I'm curious whether other folks would think it's worth buying for collecting purposes, and whether $400 is reasonable or not given the unique nature of the card.
Anyway, apologies again for newly joining and immediately asking for help - any advice would be much appreciated. Looking forward to participating in the community more now that I've rekindled my interest in magic!
Thanks for your time.
Hi ekgregory, and welcome to MTGS!
So, first things first. Thank you for posting pictures. I can't verify the veracity of the Orb over the internet - for a card like this, you're going to want to physically inspect it with a loupe, and maybe take it to a trusted dealer. As much as I'd love to be able to authenticate remotely, there's just too much wiggle room.
Second thing, yeah, those do look like Alpha corners.
Third thing: While Chaos Orb is kind of a "random" card, it is quite good in 93/94, as it's gotten format-specific errata to skip the flipping and simply blow up any card. So there is real demand for it again, and it's probably seeing more play than it ever did back in the day. It's also quite iconic (and strikingly illustrated).
Fourth thing: the Reserve list. WOTC has promised that they will never ever print Chaos Orb (among other cards) again. That's led to some serious market-cornering and price-gouging by people who've thought "Well, I can buy up ALL of the copies of this card, and charge whatever I want". UL Chaos Orbs are currently $500 on TCGp, so if this is an Alpha and not a damaged Beta, you're going to be looking at a cool grand, easy.
Thanks for the welcome, and for the detailed response! I really appreciate your insights. I ordered a loupe, blacklight, and a few other tools so I can do an initial look - I'll also poke around for a dealer nearby the location. Totally makes sense that it's not possible to verify anything online off of lousy pictures. Smile
Thanks so much for the insights on the card itself as well - it is just an iconic card as you said; for some reason it's been one of my favorites since I was a kid. Didn't realize you don't have to flip it anymore.
I didn't realize market-cornering was this wide-spread - that would explain why the prices seem so off (Beta higher than Alpha, etc.). Really appreciate the insight into the value - if I can verify that it's authentic, I'd definitely love to purchase it for <$500.
I'm hoping to check it out in person this weekend, so I will follow up on this thread in case anyone's interested in how it turns out. Thank you again! Really appreciate it. I'll start reading up on the forums so I can contribute to the community.
I have always loved Chaos Orb, and I've wanted one forever. That aside, I'm always interested in big deals going down - do tell us how it goes. Is it real? Does the seller know what he's got? Does he name a price that's firm that leaves you shaken and wondering who would part with that much money for a simple (yet gorgeous) piece of cardboard? These are the stories of our people, the tales swapped over the fire. Of COURSE you should tell us what happens.
Agreed - that's why my skepticism is raised. He's been asking a lot more but dropped it down to around $500 a few months ago. We'll see how it ends up.
I've attached 600 DPI scans of the front and back next to a couple other Alphas I have for comparison - unfortunately I don't have a higher DPI printer. The card is really pretty - great colors on the art, which is what originally drew me to it.
More info for others interested:
Happy to answer questions if anyone has any! This was a fun experience in the end - I was really stressed that the card would be fake and the negotiations would be tough but it was a fun experience overall, and I learned a lot along the way.
A few questions I have, if anyone has any advice:
I have my Orb in a perfect fit, in a regular sleeve, in a binder in a fire safe. I'm looking into Perfect Hards; they seem to be a "better" option than just perfects, because of a slight increase in protection against accidental bending, but honestly I never take it out of the binder, so it's probably fine.
It was a great buy. You are definitely overvaluing your cards. Heck, if you'd given him an UL USea, I would've called it a fair trade - there are only 1100 of these in existence!
You are correct in saying that it's impossible to know the exact price. A LP Alpha Orb sold on eBay last month for about $1.2k. Two others sold for best offers since then, probably for similar amounts. So that's around where I'd peg the value.
Grading is "worth it" if you can get a 10. You can't get a 10, so I wouldn't bother.
No, ripping them up was just an urban legend. Although some of the WOTC playtesters were brutal (decks went in blenders, and got glued together).
Let me know if you're ever interested in selling.No solicitation in the Café, please. -KnickM
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You're quite welcome. Glad we were able to be of assistance.
You really shouldn't do the bend test anymore. It's a load of bunk and it doesn't tell you what you think it does.
All Magic cards are made from paper stock. Paper fibers. These fibers have the finite ability to flex with minute traces of fibers breaking each time you bend the card this way.
This is like having a spindown counter on the card with no way to add more and you have no idea what the current count is. Each bend knocks the count down by one until one day, crack!, the card is done.
On another note, if the card is so ****ty that it will crack under the bend test, it won't pass the light test or even the eyeball test. If the card is good enough that it passes the tests noted above, it'll pass the bend test.
So please, don't do the bend test. File it away amongst the other old garbage tests like the squeak test. It's just not worth the risk.
On a separate note, I had no idea there was a squeak test!
And I honestly hope someone on this forum shuts me down and argues convincingly I'm full of BS.
But here we go.
1) I'm sorry to say but the people on this forum just don't know enough when it comes to alpha, beta, unlimted, and revised.
Goto high end magic on facebook.
2) Yes the bend test is bunk. Yes the rosette aka the dot test is one of the best tests. Yes your alpha chaos orb has the white dots in the corners. But if your card is a rebacked card, it's going to pass all those tests. If you didnt' know a rebacked card is a card from which MTG collectors edition(CE) cards were used and glued to the back of real magic cards. In short, people sand down the CE card's back. They sand down the real card's front, and glue the two cards together. Rebacked cards pass the rosette test and the little white corner test because CE cards are real magic cards!!!
3)Your card is too shiny. Far too shiny. Real beta and alpha cards don't have the sheen that later mtg cards did. Collectors edition however came out later. Much later than alpha beta. The front of the CE cards almost feel like a nice magazine. In contrast real alpha beta cards were almost rough to the touch. They were matte, not shiny.
Take a look at this alpha card.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Carte-Magic-Mtg-Chaos-Orb-VO-ALPHA/132649467803?hash=item1ee2863f9b:g:7EwAAOSwmYta~PXK
That looks like a real alpha to me. The sheen is completely consistent with what I know of alpha. In contrast, your initial pics show highly reflective sheen indicating a glossy surface.
Your 600dpi scan wasn't enough to reveal the rosette pattern, but like I said, if we're dealing with CE, that's not going to matter.
4) Finally, the biggest red flag was that you picked it up for 400. Honestly, looking at recent alpha chaos orbs having sold online, the going market rate was 4000, not 400 around the time you picked up yours. If you really picked up an alpha chaos orb for 10 times less than the going rate, it would mean that the guy who sold it to you just couldnt be bothered to be notified that he could have gotten 3600 more for it. In this day and age, you should always presume people know the worth of what they are selling.
Again, I truly hope for your sake I'm wrong. But you asked for our advice, and that's my opinion given what I see.
Edited:
You know what, here is a way to prove me right or wrong. Take a look at your other cards. Im assuming the rebacker didnt reback the false orders or ironwood treefolk. with clean dry hands touch the face of the card. The sheen on your commons should reveal to you what real alpha feels like. If your alpha chaos orb feels the same, ur good. If not, something is amiss.
Hi NierAutomata,
Thanks for your thoughtful post and information, I do really appreciate it as I'm still learning. I'll respond to your numbered points below with some additional info in case you have any additional thoughts - sorry for the lengthy response. Again, thanks for your time and no worries about being the bearer of bad news, I get that it's risky to spend hundreds of dollars on old cardboard.
I bought this with eyes wide open on the risk of it being fake, and obviously the analysis I performed when I bought it and now is based on my own limited + subjective experience. I tried to treat it as a fake card to start and perform each test I knew / read about as I went to see if that hypothesis could be proven wrong. So it definitely could still be fake even after my new analysis (which I performed at your recommendation).
TL;DR: I tested the sheen of each card and attached pics to show how they reflect light. As far as I can tell, the all feel the same (rough) and look textured / matte / rough in the same light. Price is a longer explanation below but I agree that it was a red flag.
1) Thanks, will check that out!
2) Thanks for the additional info on re-backed cards, I read up a bunch about them before I checked out this card and it seemed to me the most likely type of fake I could encounter.
2) So the pictures I posted initially were from the seller's cell phone pics posted on FB, before I bought the card. They are horrible pictures and look really shiny - I was really worried about them heading into the potential sale. The Treefolk and False Orders are my own cards bought from Card Kingdom, not the sellers'. I brought them with me to compare when I looked at the card and ultimately bought it.
Based off of your suggestion, today I took the three cards out of their sleeves, closed my eyes, mixed them up in my hands, and felt the sheen on each. I couldn't tell the difference, using every finger and method of feeling the surface. They definitely don't feel like a glossy magazine - each of them feels rough, and in the light they look almost textured due to the matte surface. I tried to capture that in the photos I attached to show that they reflect light in the same matte, textured way - I'd love to know if you have any additional thoughts from those photos. To me they feel the same and the surface looks the same at all angles of light. I would hope that if the card was rebacked and had a CE front that the surface would be relatively easy to notice a difference on, but please let me know if that's not the case. Maybe I should buy a cheap one to compare it to?
And unfortunately I don't have a high DPI scanner, so 600 was the best I could do.
4) Agreed on the price being a red flag - this had too good to be true written all over it. Mtggoldfish had the Alpha price at $1,200 for this card when I checked it out - I checked, but remember because I was obsessively checking it to try and figure out why it was so cheap. Seller only posted it on FB Marketplace, had it listed for months at $800 (which I saw and ignored for a while thinking it was too good to be true) then dropped it to $540 a few weeks before I reached out. It was not cross-listed anywhere else online that I could find and it had no description in the post other than the title - "Chaos Orb card". My warning flags were all going off, but I reached out to kick the tires and ended up talking to him on the phone. I drove over an hour out to his place to check out the card and the whole way was telling myself I'd be wasting a day of my time.
Anyway, I went out there, did my tests, and ended up spending a couple hours with him talking about magic, how he used to play a lot in the 90s, looking through his other cards, and him looking through mine (which he asked if I could bring out). It was sort of weird, but he just handed me the card very nonchalantly and asked if he could look through mine; when I asked if I could run my tests on it he said absolutely and seemed completely uninterested in it - he was definitely not anxious.
I asked him a lot of questions because I was still nervous about the whole thing. I mentioned it above, but he said he won the card in a small local tournament raffle in the 90s (which both reassured me and made me suspicious because I am paranoid). This was the only Alpha card heh had. He had decks and decks of mid-90s cards (lots of Urza's block, etc.) that were mostly unsleeved and well played, haphazardly kept in beat up old boxes, and I'm sure there was a lot of valuable stuff in there. He just handed stacks to me and asked if I awas interested in anything.
After I ran my tests, when we got to discussing price (which was over an hour into the whole thing) I told him he could definitely get a lot more than what could offer on on eBay or at an online store. At the time I had seen the $1200 figure online but it really wasn't clear to me what the card would actually go for, and it's not mint. Based off of his responses, it was apparent that he just really wasn't a technology guy, didn't know how to use eBay and didn't want to put in the time, and didn't want to ship off his cards or deal with a store (he doesn't trust them). He lived pretty far out from the city and any card store, so he wasn't super mobile.
He was really eager to trade for some old cards of mine, and didn't seem super anxious to sell the card to me or concerned if I didn't want it - he said he just didn't need it and would rather get something for it and get some new cards. He didn't know what the value was of a lot of my cards he picked, so he was surprised when I told him some of the Unlimited stuff he wanted had some value (Serra Angel, Vesuvan Doppleganger, etc.). It was sort of weird / difficult to negotiate the sale with him because he clearly knew more about all the old cards he had than me, really wanted to trade, but hadn't done a lot of research online about any of hte card values. I offered him $300 plus the cards I mentioned earlier in the thread and he countered at $350 - we settled on $330. As I left, he offered to meet up and play if I ever wanted to.
As you said, you should presume that he knew how much the card was worth, but there was also part of me that was worried that I was taking advantage of him, which is why I told him I knew he could get more elsewhere. I walked away feeling like he was happy with the deal and obviously on my end, if it's real it's a great deal.
So - all this being said, I'd love to know if you still really think it's a fake, and I'd be curious to know if you think I should bring it to a shop or try to have it graded. I still feel like it's real based on few hours of tests and examining it I've done now that I've bought it, but I am obviously biased and new to this, and did my best with the tests / knowledge / data I had. It would be a huge bummer if it isn't, but overall I'm at peace with it as I knew the risks going in.
The good news is, I bought one of the giant blown up Chaos Orb cards on eBay for $10, and I know that one is definitely real haha.