Could Vintage go the way of Legacy?

[BKclassic]

Legacy is hugely popular. Multiple GPs per year and the 5ks are fantastic. The success of Legacy has also taught us an important lesson about eternal formats: People are willing to play thousands of dollars to play them. With the unbanning of Illusionary Mask, I think we can consider the idea "cost is factor of the Legacy banned list" to be a thing of the past. So if Legacy is a huge hit, I think its reasonable to ask ourselves why Vintage couldn't be at least much more popular than it is now.

I think three things have held Vintage back traditionally. Price, Proxies, and Unfun-ness.

Price- If people are willing to pay thousands of dollars to play Legacy, it stands to reason that a significant portion of those people would pay a bit more to play Vintage. Extremely high cost of entry is clearly not the issue it used to be. If there is prize support for it, people will get the cards together for it somehow. Standard has also shown that Magic players are willing to pay a lot more for Magic cards than we have been letting on.

Proxies- Proxies are a major force holding Vintage back.You don't have to take my word for it, but authorities like Chapin, Menendian and Bleiweiss have all said its holding the format back. I think Legacy has proven that proxies aren't needed, and when they finally become a thing of the past, that will be the day the format will really start to take off.

Unfuness- People generally used to think of Vintage as a format that was only about turn 1 kills. TimeVault also didn't help. Zendikar block has changed all that now. Now pros as well as commonfolk are playing and enjoying it.

All of the things that have held Vintage back are gone. People are talking about Vintage like they talked about Legacy right before it blew up. It's the new 'best format you're not playing."

The most important thing in all this is to have a look at Vintage prices, deflated artificially by proxies: Bazaar of Baghdad 200$. Mishra's Workshop 250$. Moat and Tabernacle at the Pendrall Vale are cards that see play only as a one-of in a small minority of Legacy decks, yet carries a 250 dollar price tag. Bazaar and Workshop are pillars of the format; when Vintage gets popular and proxies finally go away, these cards are going blow up in price. Certainly Mana Drain seems like it has to become a 250 dollar card some day.

So I say invest in Vintage. Thoughts?

[Meekrab]

All of the things that have held Vintage back are gone. People are talking about Vintage like they talked about Legacy right before it blew up. It's the new 'best format you're not playing."
And then the DCI went and pooped on the format by unrestricting two ridiculous cards.

[majikal]

This can never happen because the price is far too prohibitive - much more than "a bit more" than legacy

Vintage is currently not an extremely popular format in the US, and the cost of entry is already at least $3000 for just a set of (beat) power. Add the cost of Duals, FoW, Mana Drain, Workshops, or whatever stupid-expensive cards like Jace you need and you're easily looking at 4 or $5000 for a single deck. This is right now. If it ever started to take off again, I would expect this number to rise significantly. Like, you could buy a new Toyota for the price of a non-pimp Vintage deck.

Vintage is cool and everything, but it just isn't realistic to expect it to take off again quite like Legacy has.

[dontbiteitholmes]

Legacy is hugely popular. Multiple GPs per year and the 5ks are fantastic. The success of Legacy has also taught us an important lesson about eternal formats: People are willing to play thousands of dollars to play them. With the unbanning of Illusionary Mask, I think we can consider the idea "cost is factor of the Legacy banned list" to be a thing of the past. So if Legacy is a huge hit, I think its reasonable to ask ourselves why Vintage couldn't be at least much more popular than it is now.

I think three things have held Vintage back traditionally. Price, Proxies, and Unfun-ness.

Price- If people are willing to pay thousands of dollars to play Legacy, it stands to reason that a significant portion of those people would pay a bit more to play Vintage. Extremely high cost of entry is clearly not the issue it used to be. If there is prize support for it, people will get the cards together for it somehow. Standard has also shown that Magic players are willing to pay a lot more for Magic cards than we have been letting on.

Proxies- Proxies are a major force holding Vintage back.You don't have to take my word for it, but authorities like Chapin, Menendian and Bleiweiss have all said its holding the format back. I think Legacy has proven that proxies aren't needed, and when they finally become a thing of the past, that will be the day the format will really start to take off.

Unfuness- People generally used to think of Vintage as a format that was only about turn 1 kills. TimeVault also didn't help. Zendikar block has changed all that now. Now pros as well as commonfolk are playing and enjoying it.

All of the things that have held Vintage back are gone. People are talking about Vintage like they talked about Legacy right before it blew up. It's the new 'best format you're not playing."

The most important thing in all this is to have a look at Vintage prices, deflated artificially by proxies: Bazaar of Baghdad 200$. Mishra's Workshop 250$. Moat and Tabernacle at the Pendrall Vale are cards that see play only as a one-of in a small minority of Legacy decks, yet carries a 250 dollar price tag. Bazaar and Workshop are pillars of the format; when Vintage gets popular and proxies finally go away, these cards are going blow up in price. Certainly Mana Drain seems like it has to become a 250 dollar card some day.

So I say invest in Vintage. Thoughts?

I would trade my entire legacy Enchantress deck for a Black Lotus in good condition, and my version runs 2 Moats, so no I don't think people are going to rush out and play Vintage. The cost is what's holding Vintage back more than any amount of proxies. Actually the proxies are the only reason the format still exists. If WoTC came out tomorrow and said their lawyers would start going after people who ran proxy tournaments (not that this would even be possible in reality but for the sake of argument) and in essence all proxy tournaments were outlawed Vintage would only exist at GenCon. So no, the one card that every vintage deck plays is over the cost of half the decks in Legacy and that is just one card. I don't really see why Vintage has to exist outside of proxies though, it's the right solution for that particular format. Not to mention if proxies didn't exist and the format got really popular the price of a Lotus would go up even more.

[Quark.Nova]

I don't get the idea why proxies should be a major reason holding Vintage back. I would rather think that proxies make the entry in such an expensive format more attractive for beginners. Many Legacy players may already have stuff like some Duals or FoWs, but they are still a whole P9 (speaking of several thousand dollars) away from their first Vintage event. This distance can imo only be straddled by proxies. Only a few people can afford buying cards, that expensive, just for exploring a new format and even less are willing to do so.

[whiteshepherdman]

The feeling i get from proxies is like a sort of "fakedness" and i'd never want to play with proxies thus i'd never play vintage because I would never drop that amount of money to buy myself a black lotus.

[DrJones]

You are using wrong assumptions. The unbanning of Illusionary Mask came out after they errataed the card to make sure nobody would want to play it competitively. People already have lots of problems in legacy to gather a deck together to bring to a tournament and even the pros need big shops to lend the cards to them. The "unfuness" you talk about was a conscious move of Wizards to break the format in half and force people to move to legacy.

Vintage is "officially recognized" nowadays because Wizards wants to be able to say that cards like Mystical Tutor or Yawgmoth's Will are still tournament legal in at least one format, hence why it's the only format with a restricted list.

[Purgatory]

The price issue is in a different league when it comes to Vintage. Not sure what the price situation is like in the States (I know FoW is more expensive than here though), but the most expensive Legacy decks that I see on tournament tables cost maybe between 700 and 800 euros, with most decks costing around 500 euros. In vintage, one almost has to spend at least 2000 euros to get the dual lands, the on-colour moxen, Ancestral, a Lotus and a Time Walk, and that's all of those white-boarded (ie. the cheapest you can get away with).

One can talk about playing budget decks and Null Rod till the cows come home, but to go from 0 to a complete competitive deck in vintage, I think you need to be prepared to put in a month's salary.

[Broham]

Price- If people are willing to pay thousands of dollars to play Legacy, it stands to reason that a significant portion of those people would pay a bit more to play Vintage. Extremely high cost of entry is clearly not the issue it used to be. If there is prize support for it, people will get the cards together for it somehow. Standard has also shown that Magic players are willing to pay a lot more for Magic cards than we have been letting on.


I'd just like to say that this is totally false. There is not a small margin in card prices between Vintage and Legacy - the margin is GIGANTIC. I don't know anybody "just looking to jump into Vintage". Most players get interested Legacy because they've been playing for quite some time, and have either fallen out love with Standard or have always been casuals looking for something more.

I play Legacy competitively and work on a couple of decks at a time other than my Goblin deck which is super cheap and I already had the cards in my collection. I do not plan on playing Vintage seriously ever, unless maybe I win the lottery. It's just not something I take seriously. I have attended several Mox tourneys and never have I met a Legacy player who wanted to seriously keep the Mox and attempt to build a Vintage deck. That card gets sold immediately to one of the very few and far between Vintage players.

[deadlock]

The biggest step to make Vintage more popular (and Legacy too!) would be to reprint expensive cards and give them out in limited number in order to gradually reduce prices. Reserved list prohibit this and collectors would also get angry, but it would be the best thing for both formats in the long run. Just my 1 cent..

[Nessaja]

Another thing that makes Legacy very populair is that you can bring a homebrew and do really good with it. Vintage is not a format of homebrews.

[lebarion]

Proxies- Proxies are a major force holding Vintage back.You don't have to take my word for it, but authorities like Chapin, Menendian and Bleiweiss have all said its holding the format back. I think Legacy has proven that proxies aren't needed, and when they finally become a thing of the past, that will be the day the format will really start to take off.


Just as a matter of information, here in Brazil there are no tournaments where proxies are allowed - don't ask me why. Legacy tournaments usually have no less than 30 people, while Vintage rarely have more than 10. I believe that if proxies are allowed this number would increase significantly.

I agree with most of the replies here, the price is a huge issue, and will probably always be. Even Legacy has become more expensive recently, slowing down its growth.

[BKclassic]

Firstly, I would like to stress that my I don't see Vintage getting nearly as big as Legacy. Once Vintage has "blown up", I imagine the level of support would be something like SCG having something like 3 or 4 proxie-less Power 9 tournaments each year in areas that already have descent Vintage scene, perhaps 1 in New York, 1 in Columbus and 1 somewhere on the West coast.

@Meekrab- Influential Vintage players like Menendian and Elias seem to think these changes will only improve the format.

@Dr Jones-I am pretty sure the Illusionary Masks errata only made it better since it made the face down creature an 2/2. Other than that, I am not sure it had a meaningful effect. Please correct me if I am mistaken though.

@The rest- The general sentiment is that Vintage is MUCH too expensive to become popular. I certainly agree that this is what conventional logic would dictate. But I believe that the great inflation of Magic prices over the past 4 years gives us a very convincing reason to re-evaluate how much people are willing to pay play Magic. Also, I think it is important to remember that just because you aren't willing to shell out to play Vintage, doesn't mean other people aren't. If proxies become of a thing of the past and if only 1 or 2 more out of 50 legacy players has a serious enough interest in playing Vintage so as to make them at least interested in buying Vintage singles at their the current prices, I think the increased demand could effect a prices significantly.

[dontbiteitholmes]

Not to mention Vintage is an entirely different format from everything else in Magic. I mean you could play T2 for a while and some extended and jump into Legacy and pick it up fairly quickly. Vintage is not even close. First off there are not as many resources as for Legacy. Meaningful tournament results are few and far between, the format can change 180 degrees off the printing of a single card, and resources for making a competitive list are scarce. Good Vintage players usually either roll solo or in a team and everyone holds their hand really close to their vest which is more important than in Legacy since one metagame card in a list with so many tutors can break a matchup wide open. Other formats certainly have teams and people holding back tech, but not like Vintage from what I have seen.

What I'm getting at is that even if WoTC printed power 9 and stuck them in every other booster pack Vintage wouldn't become too much more popular. It's very techy and swingy both in game and as a format. It certainly appeals to a certain type of player but overall Legacy is more like regular MTG that everyone knows and loves than Vintage could ever be and that, more than the price of any card, is the reason it is the eternal format of choice.

[Pippin]

I would say that better question is:

"Could Legacy go the way of Vintage?"

By this I mean format imploding, and basically being played less and less, ultimately reaching levels of Vintage today. Its still there, but no one really cares. Price of Legacy cards is prohibitive, and even though most prices have gone down in last 1-2 months (duals for example), its still unaffordable for many.
What would happen if Wizards actually made that rumored "overextended", and cut all Legacy GP's at the same time? With Starcitygames jumping on the bandwagon and cutting Legacy 5k's? Do you think that all prices of Legacy cards would hold, and there would be equal demand? Do you think that format would be played as much as it is today? Not likely I would say.

Little digress from OP post, but now to answer for Vintage part.
No, I think it can't and won't ever reach Legacy tourneys popularity. It won't ever have a GP or similar. Only way to make a profit from investment in Vintage cards would be if MTG as a game grew even bigger and thus creating more demand. More players would mean that atleast some part of them would like to have one of iconic cards for collective reasons, and that coupled with old players could drive the prices up.

[majikal]

If proxies become of a thing of the past and if only 1 or 2 more out of 50 legacy players has a serious enough interest in playing Vintage so as to make them at least interested in buying Vintage singles at their the current prices, I think the increased demand could effect a prices significantly.
DERP

You're defeating your own argument here. The cost right now is already prohibitively expensive. Sure, 1 or 2 out of 50 might get into the format, but I don't think that amount can cause any significant change in price, since most of the affordable power comes from people who are willing to cash out of the format. Congratulations. You now have 1 or 2 new Vintage players in your area, and you may have lost 1 or 2. Hardly what I call a renaissance.

[BKclassic]

I would say that better question is:

"Could Legacy go the way of Vintage?"

By this I mean format imploding, and basically being played less and less, ultimately reaching levels of Vintage today. Its still there, but no one really cares. Price of Legacy cards is prohibitive, and even though most prices have gone down in last 1-2 months (duals for example), its still unaffordable for many.
What would happen if Wizards actually made that rumored "overextended", and cut all Legacy GP's at the same time? With Starcitygames jumping on the bandwagon and cutting Legacy 5k's? Do you think that all prices of Legacy cards would hold, and there would be equal demand? Do you think that format would be played as much as it is today? Not likely I would say.

Little digress from OP post, but now to answer for Vintage part.
No, I think it can't and won't ever reach Legacy tourneys popularity. It won't ever have a GP or similar. Only way to make a profit from investment in Vintage cards would be if MTG as a game grew even bigger and thus creating more demand. More players would mean that atleast some part of them would like to have one of iconic cards for collective reasons, and that coupled with old players could drive the prices up.

I think you raise a really interesting point. Are eternal singles in a bubble right now, or is their increase in value a permanent fixture? Clearly the idea that eternal is going to continue to be popular (and keep singles expensive) is an underlying premise of my argument. However, it may be that eternal prices are really just a temporary bubble due to over speculation, and not so much the result of an increase in demand. The speculation value will wear off and prices will cool down to something lower than they are now but still higher than they were originally. Kind of like what happened with gasoline prices.
But what I believe to be the case is that the price increases we are seeing now are only the beginning of price increases to come. The value of Magic cards skyrocketed at a time when the economy was in the shitter other things (like houses) were losing value. When the economy finally turns around, I think a lot more people will be playing magic and there will be many more people willing to invest in vintage. I think the current drop in the price of duals is just some speculative value wearing off, most of the value underlying duals comes from legitimate demand. Once the economy really gets turned around I think we can expect prices to pick up again. I think that this narrative makes a lot sense given that Wizards has been doing a lot lately to restructure their system to get more people to play and convert those people into competitive players, who are the ones who buy the most product. I think they will only expand their efforts from here, recruiting more players, creating more demand for eternal formats.

[Rico Suave]

Fun fact of the day:

Proxy Vintage is cheaper than Legacy by a wide margin.

The more you know.

[Tha Gunslinga]

Ignoring proxies, Legacy decks range from a few hundred to $1500 at about the top. The MINIMUM competitive Vintage deck is Dredge at $800-1000. Any Shop deck will run 3000-4000+. Any deck that runs the power 8 and Forces will run $3000+. You can't really compare Vintage and Legacy prices, because Legacy is just so much cheaper without proxies.

Obviously, when you allow 5-10 proxies or more, Vintage becomes cheaper than Legacy. If Wizards eventually sanctions proxy Vintage events, which is possible, then Vintage may take off, but until then I don't see that happening.

The reason dual land prices crashed was because the Legacy bubble popped. Prices were rising quickly, and that caused a lot of people to dig up their old duals and such and sell them. This increased supply at the same time that demand was falling, since the people who were looking for duals got them and didn't need more, at least to an extent. This increase in supply and decrease in demand caused prices to fall.


Oh, and just fyi:

You don't have to take my word for it, but authorities like Chapin, Menendian and Bleiweiss have all said its holding the format back. I think Legacy has proven that proxies aren't needed, and when they finally become a thing of the past, that will be the day the format will really start to take off.

This is their OPINION. It is not fact. I don't agree with them, and many other folks do not as well. It's all speculation.

[rocketrae21]

I started playing Vintage before Legacy and absolutely loved Vintage, but there is no more support for it. Yes being in the North East is helpful, but SCG cut their vintage tournaments and the other big tournaments are usually once a year. I felt like I was holding onto a bunch of expensive ass cards for nothing. I didn't have power, but I had a mint set of Mana Drains, a Library, a Time Vault, and just various other pieces. But when a format is so hard to play and a single mox will cost you $300+ its tough to want to play. Proxies did make it nice for me, but there just isn't enough support. Eli at Jupiter Games tried to run a few Vintage tournaments and they bombed with only like 10 people showing up. I still think Vintage is the most fun format, but the price and lack of support drove me away. If I won some power at a tournament, I would just sell it because owning power today isn't all that impressive. Legacy is just more popular at the moment and people don't mind buying duals because the prices aren't ridiculous like the price of bazaars or workshops.

[Jason]

If you want to make the jump from Legacy to Vintage, just play mono-hate. I run the following:

4 Aven Mindcensor
4 Dark Confidant
2 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Gaddock Teeg
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Tarmogoyf

1 Duress
4 Thoughtseize

1 Demonic Consultation
1 Vampiric Tutor

2 Choke

1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Crypt
4 Null Rod

2 Bayou
3 Marsh Flats
2 Savannah
2 Scrubland
1 Strip Mine
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
3 Wooded Foothills
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Forest

If you have a legacy collection, then you have to find 1x Demonic Consultation (~$0.10), 1x Vampiric Tutor (~$12), 1x Black Lotus (~$800), 1x Mana Crypt (~$45), 4x Null Rod (~$30 total) and 1x Strip Mine (~$1). This totals up to ~$900 you have to spend. And that's to non-proxie out your deck. The deck is super competitive and can probably even be played without the Lotus. Just add another green mana monkey.

[Solaran_X]

Jumping right into Vintage is expensive, without a doubt.

However, drifting from Legacy to Vintage is actually reasonable. If you already have an established Legacy collection (Duals, Fetches, Forces, Goyfs, Wastelands, Heirarchs, Null Rods, Dark Confidants, etc., etc.), you have the core of many Vintage decks. If you're going for proxy Power, you can flesh out the decks with Mana Vaults, Mana Crypts, Vampiric Tutors, Demonic Tutors, etc., etc. very easily and affordably.

And if you keep your nose to the ground, you can find Power and other top end Vintage staples for affordable prices. I paid $275 for my UL Mox Jet, $80 for my UL Mox Ruby, and $850 total for 4x Bazaar of Baghdad.

[keys]

$80 for my UL Mox Ruby

O_o

[dontbiteitholmes]

Jumping right into Vintage is expensive, without a doubt.

However, drifting from Legacy to Vintage is actually reasonable. If you already have an established Legacy collection (Duals, Fetches, Forces, Goyfs, Wastelands, Heirarchs, Null Rods, Dark Confidants, etc., etc.), you have the core of many Vintage decks. If you're going for proxy Power, you can flesh out the decks with Mana Vaults, Mana Crypts, Vampiric Tutors, Demonic Tutors, etc., etc. very easily and affordably.

And if you keep your nose to the ground, you can find Power and other top end Vintage staples for affordable prices. I paid $275 for my UL Mox Jet, $80 for my UL Mox Ruby, and $850 total for 4x Bazaar of Baghdad.

Yeah, it's already been said that 10 proxy vintage is less expensive than Legacy on a whole. 80 for a Mox Ruby, LOL did you use lube?

[Meekrab]

If you have a legacy collection, then you have to find 1x Mana Crypt (~$45)
I've stockpiled 4x Mana Crypt for the day when the DCI goes insane. Don't judge me.

[BKclassic]

I've decided that what I think it comes down to is the future of Magic in general. What does Magic look like 20 or 30 years from now? Is Magic still alive? If so, what shape are the Eternal formats in? Is Vintage really doomed to never make it?

If Vintage stays dead, I would have to imagine that Legacy singles will overtake Vintage singles in price some day. Vintage singles only have value to collectors and are functionally useless thanks to Proxies. If people are still playing Legacy and Magic has continued to grow, it would makes sense that a Beta blue dual land would become the most expensive card of all time since it would be the best card for tournament play. Even though the duals were reprinted in Revised, I think the incredible demand for an overall small number of Dual lands will vastly outweigh utility that Black Lotus provides to collectors.

But that doesn't seem very likely to me. 30 years from now, Wizards will have to have done something about reprints, right? Could they ever find a way that doesn't effect the value of the old cards? If they do, than that will be great and the eternal formats will be roaring.

If not, than another choice I can think of is that the eternal formats would become the equivalent of wearing Gucci and carrying Louie bags. Wizards could create demand for Vintage singles by having tournaments were they mixed extremely high prize support with some kind of prestige element that would make players want to spend $10,000 to build a deck.

[dontbiteitholmes]

I've decided that what I think it comes down to is the future of Magic in general. What does Magic look like 20 or 30 years from now? Is Magic still alive? If so, what shape are the Eternal formats in? Is Vintage really doomed to never make it?

If Vintage stays dead, I would have to imagine that Legacy singles will overtake Vintage singles in price some day. Vintage singles only have value to collectors and are functionally useless thanks to Proxies. If people are still playing Legacy and Magic has continued to grow, it would makes sense that a Beta blue dual land would become the most expensive card of all time since it would be the best card for tournament play. Even though the duals were reprinted in Revised, I think the incredible demand for an overall small number of Dual lands will vastly outweigh utility that Black Lotus provides to collectors.

But that doesn't seem very likely to me. 30 years from now, Wizards will have to have done something about reprints, right? Could they ever find a way that doesn't effect the value of the old cards? If they do, than that will be great and the eternal formats will be roaring.

If not, than another choice I can think of is that the eternal formats would become the equivalent of wearing Gucci and carrying Louie bags. Wizards could create demand for Vintage singles by having tournaments were they mixed extremely high prize support with some kind of prestige element that would make players want to spend $10,000 to build a deck.

Man that is some serious shit there. First off, no matter where MTG is in 20-30 years the cards will still be worth money. If you need proof of this just ebay some netrunner, where singles still get sold for $5 or more all the time even though the game has been dead for over 10 years and never made it past the first expansion. I don't think Duals will ever surpass Lotus. First off this would imply that the price of Legacy decks would surpass Vintage decks and still remain proxy free, which will not happen. Either WoTC will eventually break down and reprint duals or we will all be playing proxies in 20 years, or more likely some of our kids. As much as I like MTG I doubt I'll be playing when I'm pushing 50. Either that or Legacy will die and everyone will be playing that retarded "I-Wish-I-Was-Legacy" format that noobs get wood over. Hopefully though that shit will die on the vine, because it is beyond a retarded idea to make a new format instead of fixing a policy that was a mistake from the start. Also the price would still exclude the people who dream of playing Eternal but can't afford a T2 deck, so yeah, hopefully retarded format will never happen.

[majikal]

Well, they have outs - they just don't seem willing to explore them just yet. When they exhaust all their other options, they'll eventually have to print Snow-covered Dual Lands.

[JTAubrey]

Oh, and just fyi:


This is their OPINION. It is not fact. I don't agree with them, and many other folks do not as well. It's all speculation.


Amen to that. The "proxies are holding vintage back" argument is based on the unfounded assumption that people would be more interested in a format if they actually owned all the cards for it. This makes no sense to me. Granted proxies look ugly as hell in vintage decks, but the allure of vintage is actually playing it to me and a lot of other people, not just making the deck look good (although to all the people in the "pimp" threads, keep up the good work, your decks are indeed awesome).

Coming from a poor college student, I love proxies and I borrow cards whenever I can. So the ownership thing doesn't mean much to me.