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Wow, I just bought a Badlands for 35$. Sure, it had some average wear, but getting a dual for that cheap is awesome. They're 55 for SP at SCG. And I stopped there since I didn't feel like shelling out a ton, but there were a bunch of Volcanic Islands for 50 shipped, and a Taiga I think. I got the last of the Badlands at that price.Quote:
Originally Posted by RaNDoMxGeSTuReS
They're all gone now. Glad I picked up the last two duals I needed to finish Zoo (1 Savannah and 1 Taiga) for $50 a piece. Decent condition.Quote:
Originally Posted by sigfig8
Had to do it now before the $80 price Starcity is advertising catches on.
There's now 1 Badlands and 1 Plateau for < 40$ (if you search Dual Lands) and that's it. So there are still a few other half-way decent opportunities out there. Those won't likely last long, though.
Is there always this kind of deal on ebay for dual lands, or is this an opportunity to take advantage of?
The trick is to scour ebay often. I tend to do it multiple times a day when I'm looking for a particular dual because the real deals often are purchased instantly.
The people that sell duals cheap want them to move fast. These tend to be roughed up cards or people who flat out don't know their prices.
To take advantage of this you just set the ebay listings to "newly listed."
As far as tricks go that's about all I know.
30-35$ is pretty typical for badlands and plateau. I mean, if you want duels ebay is, and has been, the best place to get the best prices for duels, or any staples for that matter.Quote:
Originally Posted by sigfig8
OMFG. I just had a gander at the MOTL prices for duals, and they exploded upwards since I last checked. And then I checked most of the other staples, and saw how high they had gotten as well. I don't have everything, but I have quite a lot (enough for a fair few decks), and that makes me so glad I paid up years ago. Probably the biggest surprises I had were RV Underground Sea and Wasteland. It was only two years ago (not even) that I needed a Wasteland for a tournament, so I bought it on the spot for $10 from a dealer (even then, I grumbled because it was overpriced). I guess that won't be happening any more.
The solution is to allow proxies of all Reserved cards on WoTC reserved list for SCG tournaments, pressure WotC to re-print staples of Legacy in some promo pack or to allow 15-card proxy limit in case WoTC continues to act like jackasses (in addition to the cards on the reserved list) for tournament use. WotC won't budge and collectors are pressuring them? Then I say fuck them and circumvent them. Don't go to any WotC sponsored Legacy events and fully support 3rd-party tournaments like SCG. You also won't have to buy these grossly expensive cards when you can just proxy. WoTC doesn't like proxies? Either re-print the cards we want or fuck off.
Huh? How many WotC sponsored Legacy events do you think there are? I'll give you a hint: two/year.Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
SCG sanctions their Legacy events because people want them to be sanctioned. If you do well at a few of those, you can really drive your rating up which can get you PT invites, so people want them to be sanctioned. And you can't play with proxies at a sanctioned event. So.... you can sponsor a tournament in your kitchen for all your friends and let them use proxies, or you can go to a SCG event with real cards.
Welcome to the "solution" to making Vintage playable since wizards wouldn't reprint their staples.Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
...
See where Vintage is now.
Proxies are and always have been a terrible idea for competitive Magic.
If tournaments which allow proxies become too successful, WotC will threaten them with litigation, you can be sure of that. They would make a strong case that proxied cards infringe on their copyrights. I don't like this any more than you do, it's just the way companies protect their intellectual property.Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sims
Then I guess I and others without 2k to blow on cardboard stop playing Legacy and let it go the way of Vintage. That's slowly what is happeneing now.
I disagree.Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
I'm sure people will quit because they can't play a certain netdeck, but I think it also leads to more innovations in deck building as we saw from the SCG this past weekend when a budget WW list took 15th. I would rather see people take this approach than quit since the format is so open right now. You don't need to play the $200+ cards to do well (I agree that Duals are the biggest issue, but you can also run the Ravinca shocklands instead if you need to).
There's also Patrick Sullivan's list that took 5th which is pretty inexpensive since you can buy 4x Fire & Lightning decks and have most of the deck already. With the Fetchlands, you can probably build from scratch it for around $200 by replacing the Foothills with Arid Mesas.
Most vintage tournaments (and pretty much all in the USA) allow 10-25 proxies. Playing vintage is actually cheaper than legacyQuote:
Originally Posted by jazzykat
Proxies would be a terrible idea and allowing proxies will def have the same effect it had on vintage. Now is the time to start investing if you want to play legacy, sure the prices went up but it seems like they will continue to go up
I agree here. I'm against proxies in Legacy even if it goes the way of vintage. Even if Legacy goes the way of vintage, it will never hit the $300+ mark on REQUIRED staples (in Vintage, power 9 is staple unless you hate it). Legacy staples will never hit vintage price marks of $300+ simply due to supply reasons (there's just a ton more dual lands/FOW than power9 printed).Quote:
Originally Posted by Whippoorwill
Take Europe vintage for example, many Europe Vintage scenes don't allow proxies, as a result, 'jank' decks and a huge diversity of decks are widely available in metagames, whereas US Vintage metagames are more well-defined featuring about 3-5 decks in metagames. The reason for this is due exactly to the proxy policy. If Legacy adopted the proxy policy, then don't be alarmed if metagames become very stale because everyone would want to play the best deck (if not the 'hyped' deck). The format is great as it is because there's a lot more innovation/design in Legacy since the format is less constrained by overly powerful cards (e.g. Power 9, Yawgwin, Workshop in Vintage). Even if prices in Legacy continue to go up, as long as the proxy policy isn't implemented, there's plenty of rooms for cheaper decks that prey on metagames to flourish and do well.
The obvious best way to solve the current problem is to abandon the Reserved List, providing supply of otherwise rare cards to a growing popular format. But it'sWotC's interest to maintain the Reservd List, and not bother with eternal formats that fetch poor monetary value for them. Imagine if they supported Legacy just a little bit more, they'll lose more Standard/limited players (from where they make money) because Legacy is that awesome and it's hard not to enjoy playing this format.
I don't think it's as big of a problem in Legacy as it is in Vintage, because in vintage the power level of the restricted list and the mana acceleration seriously puts one deck ahead of the other, while in Legacy Dual Lands only restrict your choices in deck design. As long as Goblins, Elves, Merfolk, TES, Dredge, Affinity, MUD decks remain viable, I think they're plenty of competitive, entry level decks in the format.
Its funny because with the previous LA SCG Open:Quote:
Originally Posted by Whippoorwill
Quote:
Originally Posted by AngryTroll
I keep hearing the discussion about 'end the reserve list,' or 'allow proxies.' To me, these both sound like ways that legacy will itself end. The proxy argument has a clear, real-life example of the pitfall. Removing the reserved list is not an argument that is so easily rebutted. I'll try to give it the justice it deserves.
First, let's always remember that Magic is a game we play for fun, voluntarily. It's not the air we breath. There are cards that I want that I can't afford (or choose not to spend money on). I accept this and move on. I think that the high tide decks with candelabra is an awesome deck that looks like a blast to play. I also can't justify spending 1000 on the candles. I wish I had got them when they were cheap, but a wish and five dollars might get me a... cunning wish? Just be an adult, and make decisions about Magic like you do with any other expenditure in your life. Whining about the prices of products that are not even close to being life necessities is just unbecoming. </end rant>
With that ugliness out of the way, I also think that the scarcity of some good cards, even staples, is not necessarily as bad as people make it out to be. I own an extensive legacy collection, but my favorite deck just always seems to be mono-blue merfolk. It is not terribly expensive (but it is certainly going up). My friend bought an entire merfolk deck last week for around 500. That doesn't sound like a terrible entry barrier to competitive legacy. Now he has a great deck that will be fun and competitive for years. The bulk of the money he spent was on forces and wastelands. Those are a great start to a legacy collection as well.
People shouldn't see the idea of buying into a format as so daunting. Spending 500 dollars on a standard deck (caw blade) is like spending 500 on dinner. Gratifying, but ultimately not without remorse for most. Getting merfolk or goblins is like spending 500, but being able to eat as much as you want for the rest of your life. That's not a bad deal. All of a sudden that 500, or even larger, investment is not looking bad. Legacy is not 'cheap,' but it allows people to be craftier with their purchases and ultimately get more out of their dollars. Take the plunge. Sell your standard cards if you need to. You won't regret it.
I think that wizards has quietly been doing something that is very good for the legacy format without shaking the earth to its core. An observation I made to my new legacy convert friend is that all of my creatures I use in legacy were printed after 2005. All of my spells and most non-basics were printed before 1999. Look at the most popular archetypes, and you'll find this to be true most of the time. This sounds like power creep, but it's not really that simple. Wizards has adjusted the game the make creatures a little bit more powerful than spells, which the opposite used to be true. The game's power level increases a little, but it mostly serves to make more deck types viable. How this affects the legacy player is that we find many awesome playables in new sets, because creatures have historically been weak. This makes a lot of great legacy cards pretty easy to come by and cheap. So that if you own some old staples (force, wasteland, duals) you can add different assortments of cheaper new cards and build strong, fun decks.
Lastly, the eternal gems that wizards seems to put in sets tend to not be the standard chase rares and mythics. There are plenty of relatively modern examples of this. Vial, top, counterbalance, path, pridemage, preordain, green sun, fetches, needle, clique, stoneforge (at release), and to some extent hierarch and knight. A savvy buyer can check out the spoilers, buy a few cards at presale, and get a good meaningful update to a legacy collection at a good price.
To sum it up. Most hobbies (like magic) aren't free, and legacy may be the least expensive way to play over a long period of time. Wizards has clearly, perhaps even through some degree of chance, done what they've been doing and, in the process, added cards to the legacy metagame and fostered historically large interest.
Maybe the sky isn't falling.
Cheers,
Backseat Critic
Cards like Candelbra, Moat, Tabernacle, ect. will never be reprinted and will spike in value as oon as they are played in a competetive deck. The format can sustain itself regardless of these speculative spikes. However, the finite supply of dual lands and the rising demand for Legacy is most definitly a problem that will limit the format.
Force of Will & Wasteland should be reprinted in some form or another as they do not apply to the reserved list.
It pretty much just boils down to dual lands at the end of the day. If Wizards can design new multicoloured lands with a small drawback (much like the Ravnica duals) then Legacy will be fine. If not, Legacy will plateau. It's not like people will suddenly stop playing the format just because new players can't play the decks that they want.
Having said that, I hate the Reserved List just as much as most in this thread. Cards have value because they're useful, because Magic is a game. Value should be driven by the players, not by some collector who's holding onto them for resale.
Honestly, if you're just investing in Magic to make a profit, should your opinion really outweigh that of the people who are actually playing it? You can invest in something else for profit - players and card availability should come first.