Author
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Topic: Price of Power
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fluffycow Member
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posted March 07, 2011 05:18 AM
So I use to play magic with this kid that always wanted a mox jet. I think the background story was that his Dad or uncle gave one to him when he first started playing and he traded it away for peanuts. Once he got better and knew what he was doing, he's been talking about how he wants one now. Yesterday I spoke to a friend that saw him at some local event and the kid finally got the mox jet. However, he did something which I considered to be rather foolish. Apparently, the kid saw some a dude at some event with a mox jet for trade and the two haggled the trade. From the kid's story, it seemed like the guy with the mox jet didn't really need anything from the kid, but felt bad and just traded the mox jet just to be nice. To the point of the story, the kid traded away both of his standard deck and literally all of his good cards (like wrath, sylvan library, etc) at a fraction of the price for this jet. So at the event where my friend saw him at, the kid was trading the entire time when he usually would be playing because now with his mox jet, he doesn't have a good enough deck and his entire binder is full of bulk rares. Thoughts?
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guenhwyvar Member
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posted March 07, 2011 05:31 AM
Do what makes you happy. Trading up to power you often get the worst-case scenario for your cards anyways and there's no way, unless I had a specific goal in mind, I'd trade a staple vintage card guaranteed to hold value down for a bunch of t2 jank half of which will plummet in 6 months.If he's happy with what he has, then good for him. Heck, he can still probably afford to put together Kuldotha Red from what he has left and that wins local fnm's left and right. :P __________________ -Ennui
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MTDetermine Member
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posted March 07, 2011 09:10 AM
Well, I am always amazed on how people managed to get premium for trading away their P9. When I was trading away my P9, I always got tonnes of garbage offers. For example, if T2 cards are in the offer, they will barely add up to the prevailing P9 cash price in the market. If Legacy staples are in the offer, I will probably get 80-90% of the prevailing P9 cash price in the market. In the end, I moved most of my P9 by trading them away at very fair trade. The other party's legacy staples' value add up exactly to my P9 prevailing cash value. After tonnes of garbage offers, I hardly trade now. Most of the time, I just use cash to buy what I need.....Which brings me to 1 question. Why do you need trading when you can always sell your cards for cash, and use those cash to buy what you need???
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gaeacradle Member
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posted March 07, 2011 09:55 AM
quote: Originally posted by MTDetermine: Why do you need trading when you can always sell your cards for cash, and use those cash to buy what you need???
If your goal is to buy a P9, then it takes a LOT of time to sell your cards to get to that amount. You have to put your cards up for sale at a competitive price, grade your cards correctly, sell to multiple people, sell in multiple transactions, buy shipping supplies, go to post office... It's A LOT of work! For someone in your position who can easily sell the cards for cash, you don't have that problem. But a lot of people do. Think of it like selling collection for cash. You need to offer a good discount to sell it all away. For trading up, you only have to deal with one person and go to the post office once. A lot less work. And that's one of my major pet peeves actually, when people keep throwing out : "But I can sell my cards for $X, and then go buy your cards at $X!!". Then GO DO IT!!! No one is stopping you. The truth is that when people bring this up when trading up, they're just too lazy and don't want to deal with all the works I listed above. Yi Feng, next time you have nice condition Beta/Alpha P9, let me know. I always overtrade for them if I'm trading up. 10% is the minimum even if I'm trading Legacy staples.
[Edited 1 times, lastly by gaeacradle on March 07, 2011]
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caquaa Member
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posted March 07, 2011 12:38 PM
Meh, really depends on how long he plans on playing magic. Standard cards are good today, crap tomorrow. Not sure why I keep them, but I do and I lose a ton of money all the time by not selling or trading when I can. Even taking a 20% hit to get power isn't anything compared to taking a rotation hit. newer stuff for older is never a problem in my book. I traded starcity ~300 per EX dual for a beta bayou and scrublands at a GP. I likely could have had them wayyy cheaper had I just bought them, but I got rid of stuff that I had sitting in a trade binder losing value every day.
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airwalk Member
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posted March 07, 2011 12:52 PM
I remember getting my first Mox when I was 14, I was so pumped, I traded about 120% of it's value in FoW's, Duals, and pimp AN cards and was so happy! I had almost nothing left to build good Type 1 decks, but I had a Mox and that was all I really cared about.I've never experienced something like MTDetermine has though. Locally, I have had a lot of people wanting me to trade away my power to them for a great gain on my part for Legacy Staples and good Standard stuff. A lot of people don't trade on the internet, which gives you a lot more leverage when trading your power in person versus online.
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junichi Moderator
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posted March 07, 2011 02:14 PM
I personally have no problem giving a 20-30% premium if I am trading away a lot of $5-20 cards towards a piece of power. The hassle to sell all the $5-20 cards seperately should not be under estimated.__________________ [12:06] <juni> the guy is ridiculously hard. [12:06] <juni> game* [12:06] <Malroth> ._. [12:07] <Malroth> worst... [12:07] <Malroth> typo... [12:07] <Malroth> ever... [12:07] <juni> :/
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Jazaray Moderator
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posted March 07, 2011 02:25 PM
Hate to say it, but is he sure the Mox is real? I just can't see someone just trading a Mox, for stuff he doesn't need at all, just to be "nice" to some kid he doesn't know and will probably never see again... I sure wouldn't and I'm the nicest person I know. Thanks, Jazaray __________________ A Plastered Dragon Original Limerick: There was a nice lassie named Jaz Many wished to have what she has, A delicate face, A soft warm embrace, And a whole lot of bedroom pizzazz.WeedIan: Jazaray is like MOTL's Mom. Have dinner with Jaz
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WeedIan Member
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posted March 07, 2011 02:42 PM
quote: Originally posted by Jazaray: Hate to say it, but is he sure the Mox is real? I just can't see someone just trading a Mox, for stuff he doesn't need at all, just to be "nice" to some kid he doesn't know and will probably never see again... I sure wouldn't and I'm the nicest person I know. Thanks, Jazaray
Likely it is, if he traded for 1.5x the cost in staples. I've got a couple pieces of power and if someone offered me $750 in easy to trade staple cards for my Recall, i'd do it __________________ Member Since 03/28/2001 10000+ posts 3rd in posts in Ontario 15th in posts on MOTL Top 5 in Refs in Ontario (by people who location posted)
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rats60 Member
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posted March 07, 2011 03:11 PM
quote: Originally posted by Jazaray: Hate to say it, but is he sure the Mox is real? I just can't see someone just trading a Mox, for stuff he doesn't need at all, just to be "nice" to some kid he doesn't know and will probably never see again... I sure wouldn't and I'm the nicest person I know. Thanks, Jazaray
Reminds me of a prerelease along time ago. I walked by a guy who was bragging about his trade for a Beta Mox and then he pulled it out of the sleeve and it was a CE.
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MTDetermine Member
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posted March 07, 2011 06:13 PM
quote: Originally posted by rats60: Reminds me of a prerelease along time ago. I walked by a guy who was bragging about his trade for a Beta Mox and then he pulled it out of the sleeve and it was a CE.
Wow, I cannot believe such a thing really happened.......
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fluffycow Member
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posted March 07, 2011 06:45 PM
So no one else thinks it's silly to have a piece of power and not be able to play in tournament for a few months than to not have power and have fun with the hobbie?
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gaeacradle Member
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posted March 07, 2011 06:46 PM
quote: Originally posted by fluffycow: So no one else thinks it's silly to have a piece of power and not be able to play in tournament for a few months than to not have power and have fun with the hobbie?
No one can answer that question except for the person who's getting the power. For me, I don't play much so I rather have the power
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MTDetermine Member
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posted March 07, 2011 06:51 PM
quote: Originally posted by fluffycow: So no one else thinks it's silly to have a piece of power and not be able to play in tournament for a few months than to not have power and have fun with the hobbie?
I felt tourney was stressful, and the constant deck tuning to ensure a deck remains T2 is also stressful. So I just play casually and my once T2 deck is now Legacy. If a player trades away all his decks for P9, I will think it is strange. If he trades away some decks, but still have some nice decks to play, why not? Nowadays, you can assemble some nice casual decks on a budget. $30 can give you a decent white-weenie. Madness deck does not look too expensive either. If you can afford 4 Arcbound Ravager and 2-3 Mox Opal, you can have a rather competitive affinity deck too.
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Sovarius Member
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posted March 07, 2011 06:53 PM
quote: Originally posted by fluffycow: So no one else thinks it's silly to have a piece of power and not be able to play in tournament for a few months than to not have power and have fun with the hobbie?
When it comes to, it's just ridiculous to have highpriced cards. I guess some people more money and different values than me, but what on earth would i want a card (that i can only have copy of in a deck anyway >.> ) that could pay my way to a whole, decent-good legacy deck? Or a couple cheap standard decks. Or tons of fun casual decks. I dunno, it sounds like this person was just overexcited about that particular card. But if he really wanted it then he can do all the work all over again getting his regular cards back. Which can be fun too, so does it hurt THAT bad? __________________ If you can make/print proxies, i will trade for them. Also looking for Microprose MTG computer game. Will trade for that or consider buying for cheap. Please pm
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MTDetermine Member
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posted March 07, 2011 07:40 PM
quote: Originally posted by Sovarius:
I dunno, it sounds like this person was just overexcited about that particular card. But if he really wanted it then he can do all the work all over again getting his regular cards back. Which can be fun too, so does it hurt THAT bad?
Reminds me of a recent story. In Jan 2011, local player decided he wanted to quit. Since young, his dream is to own a Beta Black Lotus. Instead of selling his cards, he proceeded to trade in over $2500 of his T2 stuff for a Beta EX Black Lotus with his regular dealer. Now he decided he wanted to play. The dealer is not willing to even give him $1600 cash for that Beta Lotus.
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gaeacradle Member
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posted March 07, 2011 07:55 PM
quote: Originally posted by MTDetermine: Reminds me of a recent story. In Jan 2011, local player decided he wanted to quit. Since young, his dream is to own a Beta Black Lotus. Instead of selling his cards, he proceeded to trade in over $2500 of his T2 stuff for a Beta EX Black Lotus with his regular dealer. Now he decided he wanted to play. The dealer is not willing to even give him $1600 cash for that Beta Lotus.
LOL. This is his fault for changing his mind within 2 months.
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CoupDeGrace Member
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posted March 08, 2011 03:38 AM
quote: Originally posted by gaeacradle: LOL. This is his fault for changing his mind within 2 months.
Well, he had paid his price.
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