*rubs crystal ball*
I am seeing a headline: "WOTC TO PLAYERS: DROP DEAD"
The doctrine of promissory estoppel allows a party to recover the benefit of a promise made even if a legal contract does not exist. Use of this doctrine relies on how significant the promisee's loss is in the absence of the fulfilled promise.
Doctrine of Promissory Estoppel
So, what happens when someone makes you a promise, you rely on this promise, act on the promise and the person does not come through? In our personal lives, nothing will happen. We will move on and be more cautious next time. Legally speaking, when one party promises to perform and the other party relies on that promise, the injured party can sue, even in the absence of a signed contract.
An example will help. Suppose you are the principal of a small high school. A musician approaches you to discuss implementing a music program on campus. Excited about the possibilities this will bring to your students, you begin planning for the program. You order construction of a new building complete with soundproofing and a stage. Next, new furniture and fixtures, drums and tubas are delivered. You may even hire staff to manage the new music program. Then, in one fell swoop, the promise is retracted. The musician simply changes his mind. You might think that, without a contract, there is no recourse to recover not only the expenses but the embarrassment of having this promise broken.
Well, the law cannot help you with the embarrassment, but the doctrine of promissory estoppel can help you to recover your losses. It states that an injured party can recover damages if those damages were the result of a promise made by a promisor and the promise was significant enough to move the promisee to act on it. There are specific elements that must be present:
Promisor made a promise significant enough to cause the promisee to act on it
Promisee relied upon the promise
Promisee suffered a significant detriment
Relief can only come in the form of the promisor fulfilling the promise
The onus is on the collector to PROVE that, under DOPE, that the abolition of the RL was the only DIRECT cause of whatever financial impact they have suffered. That is tremendously hard to do with the secondary market playing a huge factor in collectibles.
I've already spoken to litigation (twice) about this offline, and they concur.
No it wouldn't, because people do not want to act proactively because they feel intimidated or plain lazy. I'm not dealing with that. Under no circumstances should these formats restrict people based on their economic status, which is what they're doing. We invest hundreds of thousands into these formats, but they...quietly...start to fade? As a player, I feel cheated because they purposely kept this list in place knowing what the repercussions were/are.
People don't act out of fear. They don't want change because they don't care. This petition simply reflects the desire of people to want change so they can afford and play these formats, nothing more. If I'm a player and I've invested money into this format and Vintage and I can't play them because the RL is causing an upswing in pricing (which, it is), as both player and investor I don't see a silver lining here.
What am I missing here.
You post a petition asking wizards to abolish the reserve list.
Then you copy and paste some law stuff on why there is a legal case against abolishing the reserve list
Now you're saying they promised to keep the format alive?
Are you actually a sentient rubber ball? It explains how you're bouncing all over the place.
What are you talking about? I'm giving perspective as to why it exists. Some people are possibly signing a petition to end something they don't have familiarity with but understand it could have something to do with them not being able to play Legacy or Vintage. The point of the post is to explain, in detail, why the onus is on COLLECTORS to PROVE that the abolition of the RL is the cause of their suffering and damages.
That's black and white.
I'm saying they're keeping the format(s) "alive" under the guise of, "Well, we'll keep it going, but as you can see based on price barrier, SCG dropping it and the secondary market crashing, we still kind of have these for you to look at - but move right along to Pioneer." People aren't stupid. They see this is what's happening and every other post in this forum is someone talking about Legacy "dying." The point is to give perspective to those unfamiliar with the law and how it works some idea as to how it actually DOES work, in addition to reversing the way the brain has been wired with the "Remove Reserved List = Collectors will Sue" mentality.
They need proof. And my other point is that I don't think you understand how serious the situation is for these formats. It's very serious.
I tried to make this clear in the other thread, but you only need proof if your goal is to win a lawsuit for promissory estoppel. That wouldn't be the goal of a class action suit. The goal would be to get wizards to settle, which as a big company it is predisposed to do. In order to settle the suit will only need to be (1) not thrown out (doubtful it would be thrown out, they can make a case that with evidence they can prove their case, so judge will let them search for evidence), and (2) take up wizards time (and money due to billable hours). The nature of promissory estoppel means that the suit will requires months of evidentiary requests, depositions, etc. This isn't the case of wizards thinking they have an air tight case and so why the hell not, this is a case of wizards thinking they do not want to allocate resources to something that isn't necessarily going to make them more profit compared to what those resources could've been used for.
That's a good question. And that comes down to what the actual, quantifiable loss is for the collector. Let's say, for example, they abolish it and something like V.I. goes from 350 a card to 150 a card. As a collector, you have to PROVE to me as a judge that the 150 dollar value is not only market-mid accepted, but that the R.L. abolition was the CAUSE of this happening - not people in the secondary market dictating pricing.
You have to show that the R.L. itself did this and was SOLELY responsible for it happening.
So, let's assume they abolish the R.L. and calculate preemptively loss versus gain. If money is the be-all, end-all, and they opt to abolish it, you don't think that would open the floodgates for hundreds of thousands of new players to buy packs hoping to rip a foil Underground Sea? Do you have any idea how much money they would make off that?
Again, there's no way to know for sure what will happen. This is my entire point. It's fear-based, that's it. And showing a judge that proves nothing - those cards are always fluctuating.
One could show a judge what investors and collectors are doing and have been doing to the secondary market jacking these up with the buyouts and the tanks (like Alpha Investments are talking about as we speak) right now prior to any would-be RL abolition. You think that wouldn't have any weight in a court of law? That's been the story of Magic for the last three years.
Now you're talking about a whole different idea which is whether RL card prices will drop if the RL is abolished. Obviously if you don't have any tangible losses you won't be suing. But you are moving the goalposts from your original point:
Plus its just nonsense to suggest reprints won't tank prices. Do you have any example of a reprint not lowering prices (at least in the short-term)?
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