[DO NOT TRY TO SELL IN HERE] Pimp Legacy Decks

[barcode]

I would advise to play either a full foil deck or a full non foil deck in a tournament.
The problem is not that some cards are marked or not, it's just that any shitty opponent may try to take advantage of the fact that there is a difference between some cards in your deck.

Uhh... marked cards have an obvious advantage. Calling people "shitty" for wanting a fair game of Magic is unbelievable. I don't know if my opponent is cheating or if they just have bent foils in their deck.

Incidentally the penalty for marked cards is just a warning (and to fix/replace the card or sleeve). From the IPG: "The Head Judge has the option to upgrade this penalty to a Game Loss if he or she believes that a player noticing the pattern of markings would clearly compromise the integrity of the game."

[iamajellydonut]

The problem is that there are not many decks in legacy which can be all foil (affinity? burn?..), so it's quite unusual to be able to arrive at the 100%.

Agreed. There are scores of people at any event with "all foil" decks, and I can assure you that they're not all playing Death and Taxes. The issue comes when you have only a distinct portion of your deck foiled (ex: countermagic foiled and everything else non) and if they're bent. I have a creased Dark Confidant and three FNM Bloodbraids in my Jund, and whenever I've asked the head judge their legality, the response, without fail, has been "so long as you can't tell without looking at the face".

p.s. Thanks to REB and Pyroblast, Burn can't be fully foiled. :V

[caw_86]

The problem is that there are not many decks in legacy which can be all foil (affinity? burn?..), so it's quite unusual to be able to arrive at the 100%... I understand that you can take some information from that in some matches, but I don't think it matters enough to make it an issue (also I know that this doesn't matter when the decision is from a judge).
Also, if foils cannot be unbend, why not bend all non-foils from your deck?

that is why i always riffle shuffle all my decks in one direction only, if there all warped there is no difference

[Benrobnu]

Old Border + English Foil is never incorrect

On the issue of playability/cheating. I don't even understand the thought process around being able to identify foil vs. non-foil in a sleeved deck. Like am I constantly palming/massaging the top of my library? If your opponent calls you on this I automatically assume they are A) not confident enough in their ability to play to actually beat you and B) Are jackasses.

[Benrobnu]

Agreed. There are scores of people at any event with "all foil" decks, and I can assure you that they're not all playing Death and Taxes. The issue comes when you have only a distinct portion of your deck foiled (ex: countermagic foiled and everything else non) and if they're bent. I have a creased Dark Confidant and three FNM Bloodbraids in my Jund, and whenever I've asked the head judge their legality, the response, without fail, has been "so long as you can't tell without looking at the face".

p.s. Thanks to REB and Pyroblast, Burn can't be fully foiled. :V

On that note, can we get a foil promo of one of those... please. Old border k thx?

[Ace/Homebrew]

The issue comes when you have only a distinct portion of your deck foiled (ex: countermagic foiled and everything else non) and if they're bent.

The only cards I have foiled in my Burn deck are the ones that do damage to my opponent. Oh, and basic lands too! So I guess I'm not cheating after all.

[iamajellydonut]

On the issue of playability/cheating. I don't even understand the thought process around being able to identify foil vs. non-foil in a sleeved deck. Like am I constantly palming/massaging the top of my library? If your opponent calls you on this I automatically assume they are A) not confident enough in their ability to play to actually beat you and B) Are jackasses.

Step One: Sleeve fifty-nine random non-foil cards.
Step Two: Sleeve one bent foil card.
Step Three: Play "find the foil".

You can easily identify bent foil cards at a glance. I can agree with the sentiment of "what difference does it make" in many circumstances. For example, I had a beat up French Sylvan Library that could be distinguished on the left side of my deck upon inspection. I brought it to the head judge and, despite not being of any strategic relevance what-so-ever, he made me replace it (which turned out to be an enormous pain in the ass, but whatever). Anyway, stepping over to bent foils, one of the more generous people in our group plays exclusively with German foils. On one weekly I got to borrow four maximum sexy German foil Tarmogoyfs, and for the rest of the night I knew exactly where my next Tarmogoyf was and when I needed to pop fetches like a madman for shuffle effects.

[Megadeus]

Step One: Sleeve fifty-nine random non-foil cards.
Step Two: Sleeve one bent foil card.
Step Three: Play "find the foil".

You can easily identify bent foil cards at a glance. I can agree with the sentiment of "what difference does it make" in many circumstances. For example, I had a beat up French Sylvan Library that could be distinguished on the left side of my deck upon inspection. I brought it to the head judge and, despite not being of any strategic relevance what-so-ever, he made me replace it (which turned out to be an enormous pain in the ass, but whatever). Anyway, stepping over to bent foils, one of the more generous people in our group plays exclusively with German foils. On one weekly I got to borrow four maximum sexy German foil Tarmogoyfs, and for the rest of the night I knew exactly where my next Tarmogoyf was and when I needed to pop fetches like a madman for shuffle effects.

basically this. Guy I borrow stuff from fairly often is a foil fiend so if I am not borrowing a mass amount of stuff from him I get to always know when I'm drawing whatever he is letting me borrow. It's a lot more noticeable I think when you don't play with foils usually

[Fry]

It is possible to have MUD fully foiled, there are test print City of Traitors that are legal for tournament play (It's my dream foil, and I seriously doubt that I will ever have one).
Also there are the Post versions of MUD that can be all foiled too.


I've never been called out for having a mix of foil and non foils in my decks. My death and taxes deck is all foil save the set of Karakas because they are fugly foil and I already had a very minor alter done on them. I double sleeve decks, and that greatly helps in keeping the foils and non foils from looking different in the sleeves, unless you have a super bent foil.

[caw_86]

Old Border + English Foil is never incorrect

On the issue of playability/cheating. I don't even understand the thought process around being able to identify foil vs. non-foil in a sleeved deck. Like am I constantly palming/massaging the top of my library? If your opponent calls you on this I automatically assume they are A) not confident enough in their ability to play to actually beat you and B) Are jackasses.

what stone rain would you recommend, i always prefer old frame, original art for foils if possible

[Benrobnu]

what stone rain would you recommend, i always prefer old frame, original art for foils if possible

In this and a few other rare cases, the FNM foil. Although P3K would be kind of sweet.

[JPoJohnson]

Step One: Sleeve fifty-nine random non-foil cards.
Step Two: Sleeve one bent foil card.
Step Three: Play "find the foil".

Repeat this game with one bent non-foil card and you still play find the bent card. Your example brings in two different things instead of simply one. I promise that through normal play, you won't be able to easily locate the one foil in a double sleeved deck if it is not bent.

[iamajellydonut]

I promise that through normal play, you won't be able to easily locate the one foil in a double sleeved deck if it is not bent.

Yes, there is such a thing as a non-bent foil. But the whole point is that the bend makes it identifiable, and aged foils, not to mention FTV, have a tendency to bend. Non-foils that are bent are called "creased" or "water damaged".

[Phelix]

as someone who plays old nonfoilable stuff in a deck w. foils:

yes you can tell, if you try to cheat you can.


you cannot tell with my deck however, since the bending occurs when cards are stored, but when packed tightly in deckboxes.

if it were true, id woulda been disqualified from 50 or more events already.

[Esper3k]

I would advise to play either a full foil deck or a full non foil deck in a tournament.
The problem is not that some cards are marked or not, it's just that any shitty opponent may try to take advantage of the fact that there is a difference between some cards in your deck.

If your opponent is trying to get you a game loss / dq for having foils in your deck (assuming your cards aren't actually marked), they can get a DQ for Unsportsmanlike Conduct, so just keep that in mind if someone ever tries mining for a free win instead of actually playing MTG.

[Julian23]

At Ovinogeddon 2011, a friend of mine was attacking for lethal into a tapped out opponent. Little kid, about 15 or 16. So what did that guy do? He picked up my firends deck and counted all the cards to maybe squeeze out a win for wrong sideboarding. It was pathetic.

[nedleeds]

That's nothing, at Yu-Ghi-Mon events kids will steal cards from their opponents decks and hide them, then count cards for the DQ.

[Julian23]

Unfortunately, that used to be a real "thing" in Magic as well. People accidentally dropped one of their opponent's cards while shuffling, then slid them under their chair...then followed up with a pile shuffle and calling the judge for just 59 cards.

[whienot]

That's nothing, at Yu-Ghi-Mon events kids will steal cards from their opponents decks and hide them, then count cards for the DQ.

This happened to a friend of mine at a type 1 event circa 1997. He was DQ'd and quit the game soon after.

[bwah?]

Glad they match, but I think I may have gone overboard.