I have to disagree with that version of 'Proxy' (not that anyone gives a ♦♦♦♦).
But that's old-school thinking from when I played. If you wanted to use the good cards, then you had to own the good cards. Damn technology and their fancy printers. Abyssmal.
The point of 'but then everyone can't enjoy Vintage Tourney's!' is moot compared to 'So I didn't have to blow a few thousand on the good cards then, and I could have gotten a good printer at Staples and off I go?'.
Thanks for clearing up the current Version of Proxy.
Just to clarify, proxy doesn't have to mean counterfeit. In fact, that is very much frowned upon.
Just happens that the cards are so hard to find, that every tournament would have a handful of people as opposed to 20-50.
This makes it more fun, and ensures better prizes.
You still have the option to play in sanctioned events, in which case, you will have to sleeve up your cards and use them. No ifs, ands, or buts.
I personally use some proxies on some for some of the power I don't own, mostly to playtest. I don't like using MWS, so I alter other cards (herbal poultice for my moxen) to look like what I would like them to be. By no means do I try to pass them off as the real deal, but this is common practice in the states.
Most non proxy events are ran in Europe, where vintage is a little more popular.
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Currently Playing: Type I:
:symu::symb::symr: Remora Control
The point of 'but then everyone can't enjoy Vintage Tourney's!' is moot compared to 'So I didn't have to blow a few thousand on the good cards then, and I could have gotten a good printer at Staples and off I go?'.
Or a Sharpie from Staples, even. Remember, there's plenty of people out there who view the wisdom of blowing a few thousand dollars on magic cards with skepticism. Not that I'm knocking it if that's your bag; heck, I've blown fifty bucks on a card before.
When people run proxies though, that helps you. Like quicksilvervii said, that means more people are paying to enter the vintage tourney and the prizes are better as a result. Plus, if you're playing against a proxy deck, I'd be willing to bet better than even odds the pilot is not as good as someone who owns the cards. So, your chances of winning go up, and your record improves. Its a win-win situation for you and the Black Lotus Camel!
NINJA EDIT : The only qualm I could see with proxies would be if the de-valued the originals. People might not buy power if they knew they could just proxy it. But the way the prices keep climbing, either collectors make up the slack or proxying has no detrimental effect on the demand.
Proxies shouldn't have any effect on the original price. If anything, they increase the demand by allowing more players into the format.
Players in general would rather have the actual card, but if you can't afford it.. You just can't afford it. Proxies are good for the vintage community and people who can afford expensive cards buy these cards when they can afford to, with or without proxies.
Vintage should not be a format where $ = win. Don't waste energy on looking down on people who play with proxies, instead focus on playing the game.
People need to proxy cards because an average deck with proxied power can easily run almost $1,000. Take the noble fish deck I ran this past weekend. My deck was worth almost $900 dollars and I proxied: 2 Tundras, 3 Moxen, 1 Lotus, 1 Time Walk, 1 Ancestral Recall.
I ran non proxied:
3 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
4 FoW
4 Tarmogoyf
That is roughly $650 dollars right there.
Not to mention many other moderately valuable cards between $10-30.
It is not just the price of power to get into sanctioned vintage.
As a 20 year player, I don't see what the problem is with someone who owns P10 using proxies. These cards are worth $100's if not $1000's of dollars. What I've always done is bring my power in hard cases and used Collectors Edition copies in my deck as "proxies".
I would think that DCI might come around and allow this at some point in the future. You have to prove you actually own the cards but you obviously don't want your high value items shuffled by some idiot who bends, scratches or tears a $1500 Lotus. After its manhandled, its now worth $1000.I think that running proxies that Wizards themselves has actually printed is the solution that would satisfy most players.
As a 20 year player, I don't see what the problem is with someone who owns P10 using proxies. These cards are worth $100's if not $1000's of dollars. What I've always done is bring my power in hard cases and used Collectors Edition copies in my deck as "proxies".
I would think that DCI might come around and allow this at some point in the future. You have to prove you actually own the cards but you obviously don't want your high value items shuffled by some idiot who bends, scratches or tears a $1500 Lotus. After its manhandled, its now worth $1000.I think that running proxies that Wizards themselves has actually printed is the solution that would satisfy most players.
Those have square corners and IIRC slightly thicker cardstock, though. They wouldn't be allowed at high levels of proxy competition.
I think the best solution is a paper version of Vintage Masters where everything on the Reserve List is gold bordered & power is at mythic rarity; trouble with that is MaRo's Tumblr posts lead us to believe that R&D considers the reserve list to apply to non-tournament-legal cards even though it explicitly says it doesn't.
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Hey all... I'm retired, not dead. Check out what I'm doing these days (and beg me to come back if you want):
I play with CE cards all the time and I can't tell the difference between them and regular cards when sleeved. IMO, there is no more a variation in the corners than there is with Alpha cards.
Someone with ill intent could probably tell the difference between CE/IE and regular cards. That's why they'll never be legalized in any format ever. Not to mention the supply issue isn't remotely close to solved if you legalize CE/IE cards as the print run for CE and IE are very, very small/around 10,000 box sets were printed that contained 1 of each card I think/congratulations 10,000 more lotuses on the market. That doesn't solve anything and the moment WotC announces that there would be a run on CE/IE cards on the spot as CE underground sea and such skyrocketed because the front of the card looks just like beta/insanely awesome and black bordered.
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"Yawgmoth," Freyalise whispered as she set the bomb, "now you will pay for your treachery."
While something like 10,000 Black Lotuses were printed, many have destroyed or lost. Worse, many have been graded and are now in glass cases. In reality, something like 1000 Black Lotuses are actually shuffled and played with each year. The only way to acquire one is to convince someone else to part with one, so the total number of Vintage players is fixed. Thing is, some people just want to put a Lotus in a glass case. Well, now only 999 people can play Vintage and the price of a Lotus has increased because there are fewer ungraded Lotuses out there.
It's not like shelling out $5k for power is the entry price to Vintage. These cards are rare and there aren't enough to go around. For me to buy in, somebody else had to cash out. Do you want every new player to try out the format to buy a Lotus and potentially sit on it as a collector? Forcing people outside the community to buy Lotuses shrinks the community. In contrast, proxies can grow the community by removing the artificial cap imposed by the small print run of Limited Edition.
A Vintage player that loves the format don't care about playing against proxies. I for one just love playing the format as it helps get people into ot and see how magic originaly was intended to be like. I like what a peraon said to me before I was given alot of my Vintage cards from my uncle, he said, "This is a game of skil and wits, it isnt about money, here play my deck and I'll play with my proxy deck."
After playing and learning alot from him he gave me before I left a Timewalk. He was cool and was a good friend of mu uncle's. I asked him last year about it after year's of not and he jist said that he won it from my uncle in a Ante game amd felt that since he was giving up on magic, my uncle that was, that the card should go back with the others.
That was 2005 I give cards away all thw time I guess that spirit him and my uncle had rubbed off on me. But I dont mind the play Proxies and Ive let my friends pilot my Vintage deck.
I think proxies are necessary, if it wasnt for my uncle I wouldn't have my power and would be still playing vintage but with proxies.
Ive been playing magic since 1994. At certain points in that time, some of my cards have been damaged. Most notably a Mana Drain and a Force of Will were damaged but not destroyed when beer got onto the cards and into the sleeves they were in. At the time, both cards combined cost about $60 bucks if i had to replace them.
I like my cards, and really enjoy playing magic, but if something similar were to happen today, i could never afford to replace the cards. Even more significant then the loss of my precious cardboard, is the fact that these cards that i payed very little for now represent a year or 2 of college for my daughter (in my mind at least. well have to see what happens when the time comes)
Every single card in my little metal deck box is a photo copy of my actual card. I started just by making proxies for the very valuable cards, but I could really feel the difference between my proxies and an actual card, even in the sleeves. Im not trying to cheat anyone, even in casual games, so i made proxies for all 60 cards in the deck. I <snip>. The proxies look great, and you have to look twice to tell theyre not actual cards. I put a lot of effort into them to make them look authentic, I used cheap alpha cards for proxies of my more expensive alpha cards (those corners are hard to shape with a scissor) Even the foils can be proxied up pretty well if youre an arts and crafts kind of person. However, my copies could hardly be considered counterfeit cards, anyone who has ever touched a real magic card could easily feel that these are fakes.
I havent played in a tournament in a very long time, and i dont know if i ever will again, but the knowledge that my deck is worth more then both of my cars combined, gives me pause every time i consider taking my real cards out of my house. There would have to some kind of major incentive (other then a fun afternoon playing magic) to convince me to take even a small risk that something could potentially happen to the cards. it's unfortunate to have to think that way, but i do.
i wish there were a way to 'resister' the cards with the DCI or some other entity, so that I would be allowed to use my proxies in actual events.
Anyway, that's my 2 cents.
Just for fun, here are some of my proxies. The foils look a little pink in the scans, but they dont look like that in real life.
Photos removed.
- Rai
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My decks. Feel free to make suggestions. The Precious B___U___G___R___W
I was thinking yesterday that I want to Proxy my Shops deck a touch because I hate carrying power. So I plan to buy Mishra's Toy Workshop, Blacker Lotus and a set of Jack in the Mox as my proxies.
I have heard about that as well. I think I've heard about tournaments in Chicago where you can have up to 15 proxies - that'd make Dredge less than $200. Wish I could find some now that I play :/
I have heard about that as well. I think I've heard about tournaments in Chicago where you can have up to 15 proxies - that'd make Dredge less than $200. Wish I could find some now that I play :/
I would also be interested in proxy Vintage if there were tournaments locally. $200 for 15 proxy Dredge is about right, though $700 with 5 proxies or $400 for 10 proxy would be manageable by tournament Magic standards. Bazaar of Baghdad is about $1200 even played. Chalice of the Void and Leyline of the Void are $40 or $50, Bridge from Below is about $25, Undiscovered Paradise $15, Bloodghast $12, a few $3 or $4 cards, the rest $1 or $2.
Just to clarify, proxy doesn't have to mean counterfeit. In fact, that is very much frowned upon.
Just happens that the cards are so hard to find, that every tournament would have a handful of people as opposed to 20-50.
This makes it more fun, and ensures better prizes.
You still have the option to play in sanctioned events, in which case, you will have to sleeve up your cards and use them. No ifs, ands, or buts.
I personally use some proxies on some for some of the power I don't own, mostly to playtest. I don't like using MWS, so I alter other cards (herbal poultice for my moxen) to look like what I would like them to be. By no means do I try to pass them off as the real deal, but this is common practice in the states.
Most non proxy events are ran in Europe, where vintage is a little more popular.
Type I:
:symu::symb::symr: Remora Control
Type 1.5
:symw::symu::symg: NO CounterTop
Type II:
Standard is AIDS
Or a Sharpie from Staples, even. Remember, there's plenty of people out there who view the wisdom of blowing a few thousand dollars on magic cards with skepticism. Not that I'm knocking it if that's your bag; heck, I've blown fifty bucks on a card before.
When people run proxies though, that helps you. Like quicksilvervii said, that means more people are paying to enter the vintage tourney and the prizes are better as a result. Plus, if you're playing against a proxy deck, I'd be willing to bet better than even odds the pilot is not as good as someone who owns the cards. So, your chances of winning go up, and your record improves. Its a win-win situation for you and the Black Lotus Camel!
NINJA EDIT : The only qualm I could see with proxies would be if the de-valued the originals. People might not buy power if they knew they could just proxy it. But the way the prices keep climbing, either collectors make up the slack or proxying has no detrimental effect on the demand.
Players in general would rather have the actual card, but if you can't afford it.. You just can't afford it. Proxies are good for the vintage community and people who can afford expensive cards buy these cards when they can afford to, with or without proxies.
Vintage should not be a format where $ = win. Don't waste energy on looking down on people who play with proxies, instead focus on playing the game.
D3@D
I ran non proxied:
3 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
4 FoW
4 Tarmogoyf
That is roughly $650 dollars right there.
Not to mention many other moderately valuable cards between $10-30.
It is not just the price of power to get into sanctioned vintage.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?p=10498534#post10498534
I would think that DCI might come around and allow this at some point in the future. You have to prove you actually own the cards but you obviously don't want your high value items shuffled by some idiot who bends, scratches or tears a $1500 Lotus. After its manhandled, its now worth $1000.I think that running proxies that Wizards themselves has actually printed is the solution that would satisfy most players.
Those have square corners and IIRC slightly thicker cardstock, though. They wouldn't be allowed at high levels of proxy competition.
I think the best solution is a paper version of Vintage Masters where everything on the Reserve List is gold bordered & power is at mythic rarity; trouble with that is MaRo's Tumblr posts lead us to believe that R&D considers the reserve list to apply to non-tournament-legal cards even though it explicitly says it doesn't.
https://twitch.tv/annorax10 (classic retro speedruns & occasional MTGO/MTGA screwaround streams)
https://twitch.tv/SwiftorCasino (yes, my team and I run live dealer games for the baldman using his channel points as chips)
Currently Playing:
Retired
It's not like shelling out $5k for power is the entry price to Vintage. These cards are rare and there aren't enough to go around. For me to buy in, somebody else had to cash out. Do you want every new player to try out the format to buy a Lotus and potentially sit on it as a collector? Forcing people outside the community to buy Lotuses shrinks the community. In contrast, proxies can grow the community by removing the artificial cap imposed by the small print run of Limited Edition.
https://www.cubecobra.com/cube/list/p420
After playing and learning alot from him he gave me before I left a Timewalk. He was cool and was a good friend of mu uncle's. I asked him last year about it after year's of not and he jist said that he won it from my uncle in a Ante game amd felt that since he was giving up on magic, my uncle that was, that the card should go back with the others.
That was 2005 I give cards away all thw time I guess that spirit him and my uncle had rubbed off on me. But I dont mind the play Proxies and Ive let my friends pilot my Vintage deck.
I think proxies are necessary, if it wasnt for my uncle I wouldn't have my power and would be still playing vintage but with proxies.
Just sharing the story and the thought.
Ive been playing magic since 1994. At certain points in that time, some of my cards have been damaged. Most notably a Mana Drain and a Force of Will were damaged but not destroyed when beer got onto the cards and into the sleeves they were in. At the time, both cards combined cost about $60 bucks if i had to replace them.
I like my cards, and really enjoy playing magic, but if something similar were to happen today, i could never afford to replace the cards. Even more significant then the loss of my precious cardboard, is the fact that these cards that i payed very little for now represent a year or 2 of college for my daughter (in my mind at least. well have to see what happens when the time comes)
Every single card in my little metal deck box is a photo copy of my actual card. I started just by making proxies for the very valuable cards, but I could really feel the difference between my proxies and an actual card, even in the sleeves. Im not trying to cheat anyone, even in casual games, so i made proxies for all 60 cards in the deck. I <snip>. The proxies look great, and you have to look twice to tell theyre not actual cards. I put a lot of effort into them to make them look authentic, I used cheap alpha cards for proxies of my more expensive alpha cards (those corners are hard to shape with a scissor) Even the foils can be proxied up pretty well if youre an arts and crafts kind of person. However, my copies could hardly be considered counterfeit cards, anyone who has ever touched a real magic card could easily feel that these are fakes.
I havent played in a tournament in a very long time, and i dont know if i ever will again, but the knowledge that my deck is worth more then both of my cars combined, gives me pause every time i consider taking my real cards out of my house. There would have to some kind of major incentive (other then a fun afternoon playing magic) to convince me to take even a small risk that something could potentially happen to the cards. it's unfortunate to have to think that way, but i do.
i wish there were a way to 'resister' the cards with the DCI or some other entity, so that I would be allowed to use my proxies in actual events.
Anyway, that's my 2 cents.
Just for fun, here are some of my proxies. The foils look a little pink in the scans, but they dont look like that in real life.
Photos removed.
- Rai
The Precious
B___U___G___R___W
The latter does not imply the former.
Current decks of choice:
Vintage: Shops.
Legacy: Lands.
Modern: Lantern.
UWR Jeskai Control
BUG Sultai Infect (Under construction)
Pauper
UR UR Delver
RUG Affinity
Standard
G Boggle Horse Green
R Goblin Gift God bless SaffronOlive
Commander
UG Edric, Spymaster of Trest (not online yet)
Vintage
WUBRG Dredge
I would also be interested in proxy Vintage if there were tournaments locally. $200 for 15 proxy Dredge is about right, though $700 with 5 proxies or $400 for 10 proxy would be manageable by tournament Magic standards. Bazaar of Baghdad is about $1200 even played. Chalice of the Void and Leyline of the Void are $40 or $50, Bridge from Below is about $25, Undiscovered Paradise $15, Bloodghast $12, a few $3 or $4 cards, the rest $1 or $2.
Vintage: Dredge | Legacy: Burn, Goblins, Soldier | Standard: Mono-Red Aggro
Commander: Nicol Bolas, Sliver Overlord, Rafiq
Casual: Selesnya Saproling Smackdown, Izzet Labs, Rebel
Played since June 2004, mostly inactive June 2011 to March 2018
Other usernames include AlanFromRochester, homerthebeerbaron
MTG checklists from Alpha to Ravnica Allegiance - https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/magic-fundamentals/other-magic-products/third-party-products/805324-checklists-for-everything-from-alpha-to-ravnica