I've recently had exactly this problem. I have my whole cube in perfect fits inside KMC silver sleeves, but recently had trouble with a couple packages of replacement outer sleeves. The perfect fits just didn't fit inside them, disappointing since they're from the same company. I've been debating switching brands as my current supply of outer sleeves wears out.

Ultra Pro has given me some pretty bad experiences---the Magic-branded sleeves used to be excellent, as Rich describes, but the more recent ones have a flimsy backing that peels very quickly (this happened to two of the Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas sleeves within the first round I used them!). The Ultra Pro pro-matte sleeves have worked okay for me, but I haven't used them in combination with perfect fits.

I've heard mostly positive things about Dragon Shields, so they're at the top of my list to try.

Maybe this is obvious, but can I use Havengul Lich's ability to play creatures (without flash) from graveyards when it's not my turn? It's not addressed in the FAQ for DKA.

I cut Geordie some slack, since he's clearly trying to elicit the maximum audience reaction to what he feels is an important issue. It's definitely longer than optimal. My interpretation is that he framed it as a letter to a hypothetical daughter to create a character in the mind of the reader, designed to elicit sympathy and a different reaction than talking about adult women.

Geordie is giving Alyssa specifically too much latitude, since she didn't even hint at the legitimate gamer-rejection rationale posed by Geordie's and Anne Forsythe's articles. Alyssa deserved some public disapproval for her crass and frivolous post, but the attacks on her personal worth/virtue/appearance, and on women in general, were inappropriate, and should also be denounced. But Geordie's point is much larger and well taken, that the gaming community as a whole has a problem with how unwelcoming, even hostile, the community is to women.

Geordie's example of his own reaction to a similar instance a decade ago is a major piece of how he's interpreting this incident, and he's not wrong to see the same angst behind a lot of the nerdrage this time. He's not saying every gamer is a misogynist frat boy; he's saying that the portrayals of women in gaming, and the subset of gamers who do express these views, are enough to create a substantial problem. That much of his argument is hard to dispute.

It seems clear they didn't bother with other formats this time because Standard is at least a thousand times (possibly 10,000 or 100,000 times) as important to their business, and if Eternal players are literally only asking for some "would-be-nice" unrestrictions/unbans, I can understand that they wouldn't want to bother cluttering up the announcement.

Aaron Forsythe: "Aside on the Reserve List: I hate that it exists. Creating it in the first place was reactionary and causes me no end of grief. What I do like, however, is working for a company with integrity that will stand by its promises. So it isn’t going away, which is inconvenient but correct."
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Discussion.aspx?multiverseid=108931

Mark Rosewater: "byop asked: If you could change one thing about magic's past, what would you change?
I’ve seen enough time travel movies to know I’m not supposed to change anything. But if I’m forced to change something, I guess I’d do away with the Reserved List."
http://markrosewater.tumblr.com/post/5054544273/if-you-could-change-one-thing-about-magics-past-what

With comments like these, it's obvious that there must be some greater force in the company (most likely legal counsel) saying that the reserved list is Now and Forever Binding. Therefore, we can infer that further arguments about it are largely pointless except to vent angst. The future is to find alternatives.

In fact, when I was thinking about it, if the Magic community goes nuts for Modern/Overextended, it will slow down Legacy's imminent demise by forestalling the skyrocketing demand. Right now, Legacy is the only viable place for most Constructed tournament players to try to have any fun, so it's flooded. If there were a different option, Legacy prices would likely plateau or increase at a lower rate, allowing the format to reach an equilibrium rather than collapse under the weight of its popularity.

@DubDub:
I think it's a fallacy to infer that R&D only wants people to play Standard, or has it in their minds that it's their job to prevent defections from their mainstay. They are completely aware that tons of players have no interest in Standard, and of the reasons they benefit from Eternal. MaRo is always saying stuff like this tweet from an hour ago: "The key challenge to every Magic design: Make everyone love something." There would be little reason to print a card like Mental Misstep if they didn't want to support Legacy. They wouldn't explicitly steer people into, for instance, Commander---with a dedicated product launch, no less---if they prioritized making Standard the only game in town. The same goes for the FNM legalization of Block and Extended.

They have every reason to reprint cards for a hypothetical "Modern" in 2020. Products like Duel Decks and FNM promos increase circulation and sell new product. As TMD has covered before, Eternal players aren't just Eternal players. I draft roughly twice per week. Other people play online, with entry fees. Almost everyone who plays Eternal has taught people to play, been a public face of the game to non-players ("brand ambassador" in marketing-speak), loaned people cards, participated in the secondary market that gives Magic cards long-term value, supported an LGS, and done a million other things that bring WotC revenue. Keeping us in the game is a serious goal of the company.

TL;DR: Wizards isn't run by morons; they appreciate Eternal. Modern is the way of the future.

And the more I think about it, the happier I am that they picked Mirrodin as the cutoff (although my nickname for this format is "UFO: Ugly Frames Only"). A format without Tendrils of Agony is strictly better than one with it.

They're definitely admitting that Extended is dead, and certainly everyone knows Legacy is moribund. I, for one, welcome this development.

Cracking boxes for singles is almost never worth it for a non-dealer, because you both won't open enough to experience an even distribution of the set's print run and won't have an efficient way to profit from bulk cards. To almost any regular player who will be trading primarily with other players, and thus probably interacting through a binder, there are only probably a couple of dozen cards you'll be able to offload, and it would be for other cards, not cash.

On the other hand, if I had the cashflow to support it on top of my existing Magic spend rate, I'd be setting aside at least a box of each set for potential price appreciation and nostalgic drafting 5+ years in the future. Unopened boxes of sets that have at least some long-term playables do go up in price everywhere I've seen them listed; only sets like Saviors of Kamigawa go down. And boxes are a pretty efficient/fungible increment to sell off one way or another if you never end up participating in a draft using it.

If you look at the thread after the Wizards announcement of the bans, you'll see lots of players saying this is too severe. I think they're wrong or blinded by Pro-worship; this is a very appropriate punishment considering that the real penalty could be a lawsuit (especially to Matignon over the NDA violation). Lurking lawyers correct me if I'm way off, but I'd assume---if they wanted to---that Wizards would file the suit under US (Washington state) law, and French courts would respect that the contract was executed under that jurisdiction. Barring some bizarreness, France is not some remote country that doesn't have intellectual-property laws.

Wizards may opt not to sue them due to the high visibility of this banning as a punishment, and the desire not to be perceived as "persecuting the fans" in any greater degree. I'm guessing they're taking a strong look at stopping the special treatment for print magazines---and good riddance. Risking the entire game's marketing strategy on the ability of a bunch of 20-somethings all over the globe to keep a PDF secret is foolhardy, and the backlash over privileging certain pros with information they're undoubtedly using to gain an edge is added weight for withholding future godbooks.

I doubt WotC looks at the "savings" from not paying these pros, since these guys not being around just means other pros will get the Pro points to attain higher levels/prizes.

Oh man, I have sooooo many BattleTech sourcebooks, novels, and cards with his art on them, looking through that link. I had never really noticed due to how young I was when I was into BT.

Sad news, indeed.

The reason is that, while each player may know many players who acknowledge a certain valuation for a card, and even many players who want that card, the player seeking to sell a card for cash has to find someone looking to put that much cash into their Magic collection for that specific card. Most of the players I know are looking to trade cards for cards rather than shell out real money.

This is similar to why SCG, for instance, offers +25% if you accept store credit instead of cash---it erodes their margins, but you'll be buying other items that have profit built in. (Plus the classic retailer's love of the gift card, since IIRC only 85% of the value is ever redeemed, and if it's 100% redeemed, the customer probably bought $X above that.)

So if I were looking to cash out my Ancestral, even if everyone at FNM would agree it's worth maybe $300, and a few want to play Vintage or aspire to own every card, one of those guys has to have the money for the transaction to take place at that price. Using something like Ebay to get closer to full value includes additional transaction costs and risks that many (myself included) don't want to bother with. There's no efficient mechanism for me to have the dealers bid against each other besides their public buylists, and all the major dealers have very similar business models that require similar margins.

The issue is liquidity. The middlemen exist because, for many players, it's too much effort to seek out the customers that the dealers will eventually use their scale to find.

I recommend that readers interested in this thread also check out http://www.mananation.com/bubble-bubble-bleiweiss-and-trouble/, especially the comments thread, which includes posts from Ben Bleiweiss. I'm wading through it now, and finding it educational.

Also, Aaron Forsythe's Twitter posts (@mtgaaron) were positively bursting with Eternal information roughly a week ago, including possibly the strongest confirmation yet that the reserved list is permanent.

Your memory is correct, Isochron Scepter peaked at 2.4 copies per Top 8 in my January 2004 results (summarized here), then rapidly disappeared.

EDH is by far the best Constructed format. The fact that the entire premise of the format is "you could play that way, but please don't, because the point of a game is to be fun" is awesome. The masses of Magic players find keeping up with tournament formats intimidating, but enjoy Eternal because of the nostalgia/history/infinite-options feeling. EDH gives the pluses of Eternal without the minuses of tournament-tuned, unfun "best decks", since playing the best decks (e.g., Arcum, Zur, Erayo) is explicitly frowned on, if not banned (Rofellos). Plus, the concept of a general is magnetic to everyone's Vorthos side.

EDH will continue to sustain value for relevant cards. SCG can barely keep Darksteel Ingot in stock, and that's a 2004 common! Legendary creatures, especially foils, will benefit from this consistently, as will good "Voltron" enablers, because of decks like Isamaru, Rafiq, and Uril that use lots of equipment and/or Auras. So Stoneforge Mystic is going to stay expensive, probably even after it leaves Extended.

Sure, I'm predicting that they would have to ban the $100+ cards, otherwise so few people would be able to play sanctioned Legacy that the format would functionally cease to exist. I'm predicting they'd announce it long in advance to prevent some kind of overnight price collapse. On the other hand, there's nothing stopping a Force of Will reprint (FTV, Judge foil, whatever), so if they keep ignoring that as FoW hits $100, it's a sign that they plan to let the format slowly die off.

My read on the original topic of the SCG buylist is that these cards have retained value well enough---or skyrocketed dramatically in price---and sold so consistently, that there's no reason not to grab all the supply that's not nailed down. Heck, I'm considering selling my Ancestral Recall to them. It's been collecting dust for most of the ~7 years I've owned it.

The theory I'm coming around to, barring a sudden outbreak of common sense resulting in the abolition of the reserved list, is that Wizards will eventually do a wave of secondary-market-driven bans, which they'll announce a year in advance. Otherwise, they'll just let Legacy wither away, with "OverExtended" as their next eternal format.

If the duals and Forces reach prices someone won't pay for Legacy, what kind of proxy limit are you talking about for Vintage? 20? 25?

I checked Booster Draft, EDH, and Cube. I have a Type 4 stack, but use it so rarely I opted not to check it.

If I had a completely steady supply of opponents for EDH and Cube, my booster drafting would probably plummet to, like, once per set.

Also, in the last few months I've spent more time designing and tweaking my cube than all other Magic activities combined. Totally addictive.

How much artifact / graveyard / blue hate does someone need in order to not get completely buried in Vintage?

I'm glad you enjoyed it! I encourage everyone to build a cube, especially oldsters, since it provides variety and depth that Eternal Constructed sometimes doesn't, and it's always a fresh experience at no added cost.

The one group that should cheer against my aesthetic crusade is the card-altering community, which I am channelling increasing money toward to fix the ugly new cards.

P.S., it's super weird to have a hobby that makes me feel like such an old man at the age of 24.

I'm not sure if there are a lot of TMDers who cube draft, but for anyone interested, CubeDrafting.com just published a guest article I wrote on my cube:

Time Spiral, Cubed

I agree that the membership structure isn't doing what it used to, and it relates to this quote. In 2003, when I was a newcomer to TMD, I was excited to be in a higher user group because the overlap between those users and the leaders of the format was very, very high. The high-level users were virtually all super-active and so very visible. Just check out the post counts. I'm still #19 five years after I've done anything relevant. All the other factors discussed in this thread have eroded that "TMD is your team" spirit, making status on the "team"---and thus posting---less recognized as a rite of passage.

Also, Tito del monte is completely right about EDH being the go-to play-with-anything format. Legacy is for Spikes; EDH is fun for anyone. That leaves Vintage in an awkward place.

Really? No other TMDers entered this?

I just got the email that I'm out based on the multiple-choice test. If anyone is interested, I'll post my essay answers for y'all to enjoy.

# Copies of Unrestricted Cards in T16
(Restricted cards can be determined from how many decks they appeared in, see above)

Force of Will Leyline of the Void Dark Confidant Underground Sea Jace, the Mind Sculptor Polluted Delta Yixlid Jailer Misty Rainforest Nature's Claim Spell Pierce Island Hurkyl's Recall Mana Drain Chain of Vapor Duress Flooded Strand Relic of Progenitus Chalice of the Void Dark Ritual Lodestone Golem Mishra's Workshop Serum Powder Tangle Wire Wasteland Pithing Needle Thoughtseize Tropical Island Ancient Tomb Darkblast Thorn of Amethyst Bazaar of Baghdad Bloodghast Bridge from Below Cabal Therapy Golgari Grave-Troll Lotus Cobra Mindbreak Trap Narcomoeba Red Elemental Blast Sphere of Resistance Stinkweed Imp Swamp Tendrils of Agony Tundra Undiscovered Paradise City of Brass Maze of Ith Null Rod Perish Preordain Smokestack Tormod's Crypt Verdant Catacombs Voltaic Key Crucible of Worlds Ichorid Inkwell Leviathan Pyroblast Sensei's Divining Top Shattering Spree Volcanic Island Cabal Ritual Ghost Quarter Goblin Welder Karn, Silver Golem Misdirection Ravenous Trap Swords to Plowshares Trygon Predator Ad Nauseam Chrome Mox Dakmor Salvage Disenchant Dread Return Duplicant Forest Greater Gargadon Leyline of Sanctity Lightning Bolt Magus of the Moon Mountain Petrified Field Rebuild Serenity Trinket Mage Xantid Swarm Aven Mindcensor Bayou Energy Flux Golgari Thug Night's Whisper Rishadan Port Rolling Earthquake Solemn Simulacrum Sower of Temptation Triskelion Auriok Salvagers Barbarian Ring Doom Blade Echoing Truth Firestorm Flame-Kin Zealot Gorilla Shaman Honor the Fallen Ingot Chewer Iona, Shield of Emeria Mishra's Factory Nature’s Claim Plains Powder Keg Scalding Tarn Seal of Cleansing Snow-Covered Island Sphinx of the Steel Wind Wispmare Aether Spellbomb Diabolic Edict Engineered Explosives Ethersworn Canonist Infest Massacre Mindslaver Sadistic Sacrement Sensei’s Divining Top Slaughter Pact Snuff Out Tezzeret the Seeker Vendillion Clique

40 32 31 28 24 24 23 22 22 20 18 17 16 14 14 14 14 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 11 11 11 10 10 10 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

Surprise data from Phil!

A total of 128 unrestricted and 36 restricted cardnames appeared at least once.

The only unrestricted nonlands played by over half the field were Force of Will, Hurkyl's Recall, and Jace, the Mind Sculptor. The lands were Island, Misty Rainforest, and Underground Sea.

The most-run sideboard-only card was Yixlid Jailer. Leyline of the Void would tie if one deck hadn't run it main. Hurkyl's Recall and Nature's Claim were the cards which appeared conspicuously often in both maindeck and sideboard.


Number of T16 decks using a card (SB use noted)

Mox Jet Mox Sapphire Black Lotus Mox Emerald Mox Pearl Mox Ruby Ancestral Recall Mana Crypt Sol Ring Brainstorm Island Tolarian Academy Demonic Tutor Force of Will Hurkyl's Recall Jace, the Mind Sculptor Misty Rainforest Underground Sea Vampiric Tutor Yawgmoth's Will Time Walk Dark Confidant Leyline of the Void Merchant Scroll Mystical Tutor Polluted Delta Ponder Tinker Yixlid Jailer Darkblast Lotus Petal Mana Vault Nature's Claim Relic of Progenitus Time Vault Voltaic Key Flooded Strand Inkwell Leviathan Mana Drain Sensei's Divining Top Spell Pierce Tropical Island Chain of Vapor Necropotence Pithing Needle Strip Mine Swamp Duress Forest Gifts Ungiven Library of Alexandria Mindbreak Trap Perish Rebuild Tendrils of Agony Thirst For Knowledge Tormod's Crypt Ancient Tomb Bayou Cabal Ritual Chalice of the Void Dark Ritual Fact or Fiction Lodestone Golem Misdirection Mishra's Workshop Preordain Pyroblast Ravenous Trap Red Elemental Blast Serum Powder Tangle Wire Thorn of Amethyst Thoughtseize Trinisphere Tundra Verdant Catacombs Volcanic Island Wasteland Bazaar of Baghdad Bloodghast Bridge from Below Cabal Therapy City of Brass Crucible of Worlds Dakmor Salvage Disenchant Doom Blade Dread Return Duplicant Echoing Truth Flame-Kin Zealot Ghost Quarter Goblin Welder Golgari Grave-Troll Golgari Thug Ichorid Iona, Shield of Emeria Karn, Silver Golem Lotus Cobra Maze of Ith Mind’s Desire Narcomoeba Null Rod Petrified Field Plains Rolling Earthquake Scalding Tarn Serenity Shattering Spree Smokestack Snow-Covered Island Sower of Temptation Sphere of Resistance Sphinx of the Steel Wind Stinkweed Imp Swords to Plowshares Timetwister Trygon Predator Undiscovered Paradise Ad Nauseam Aether Spellbomb Auriok Salvagers Aven Mindcensor Balance Barbarian Ring Chrome Mox Demonic Consultation Diabolic Edict Energy Flux Engineered Explosives Ethersworn Canonist Firestorm Gorilla Shaman Greater Gargadon Honor the Fallen Imperial Seal Infest Ingot Chewer Leyline of Sanctity Lightning Bolt Magus of the Moon Massacre Memory Jar Mindslaver Mishra's Factory Mountain Night's Whisper Powder Keg Rishadan Port Sadistic Sacrement Seal of Cleansing Sensei’s Divining Top Slaughter Pact Snuff Out Solemn Simulacrum Tezzeret the Seeker Trinket Mage Triskelion Vendillion Clique Wispmare Xantid Swarm Yawgmoth’s Bargain

14 14 13 13 13 13 12 12 12 11 11 11 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 9 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 5 5 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

(4 SB+main, 1 SB only) (1 SB+main, 7 SB only) (all SB) (1 SB+main, 3 SB only) (4 SB+main, 1 SB only) (all SB) (1 SB+main, 2 SB only) (1 SB+main, 4 SB only) (1 SB+main, 2 SB only) (all SB) (all SB) (2 SB only) (all SB) (1 SB only) (3 SB only) (1 SB+main, 2 SB only) (1 SB+main, 1 SB only) (all SB) (1 SB only) (1 SB only) (2 SB+main) (1 SB only) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (2 SB+main) (1 SB only) (1 SB+main) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB) (all SB)

SPEAK NOW UNTO THE TMD ORACLE


"Being white means to engage in a day-in, day-out struggle to prove that you are smarter than other white people." -SWPL

I'm 23, turning 24 in a few weeks. I started writing for SCG at age 17(!), shortly after my first posts to TMD. I've been a Magic player since 1996, and still consider myself one despite years passing between games.

Maybe you'll feel better after you see my detailed objections.

And thanks for the "Star Trek: Lens Flare" quip. I'll be using that.

IMDB and Netflix both list Taken as 2008, so I'm leaving it out. If it were in, it would be in contention for my favorite of the year.

Seen (mostly via Netflix)
He's Just Not That Into You
Coraline
Push
An American Affair
Watchmen
I Love You, Man
American Swing
Star Trek
Powder Blue
Up
The Hangover
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
District 9
Inglourious Basterds
The Informant
Zombieland
The Men Who Stare At Goats
The Blind Side
Avatar

Want to see but haven't: Knowing; Adventureland; Battle For Terra; The Hurt Locker; Bruno; (500) Days of Summer; A Serious Man; The Invention of Lying; Whip It; Where the Wild Things Are; Precious; The Fantastic Mr. Fox; Bad Lieutenant; Up In the Air; Invictus; Crazy Heart; Sherlock Holmes

My favorites of the year:

# 1. District 9
# 2. Inglourious Basterds
# 3. Up
# 4. Avatar
# 5. The Informant

The problem with January is that I just don't see movies in theaters often enough to be caught up on all the titles from last year that I expect to compete for my affections. For instance, everything I've read makes me think I'll love Hurt Locker and Crazy Heart, but on the basis of what I've seen so far, this Top 5 feels padded.

On the contrarian side, I despised the new Star Trek. When I saw it, I came up with about a dozen major plot objections immediately. Not like suspension-of-disbelief objections; it was more like implausibility so severe it took me out of the movie every few minutes.

Avatar was good, I might say very good, but not quite the revolution the hype makes it out to be. It was visually stunning, but had flaws, most notably whenever it made me worry I was about to watch an excerpt from Pocahontas or Fern Gully. I thought the love story was kind of shoehorned in.

On a related note, my friends and I were talking about the Academy Awards increase to ten nominees for Best Picture, and for me the best outcome of that would be finally letting Pixar compete where it should have all along, for Best Picture overall. This year seemed weak to us, so filling out ten slots while also ignoring an excellent, commercially successful animated movie seems dumb.

This thread is a prototype to specifically prompt for results of testing and tournament matches from a given matchup between the winning decks of a recent tournament. The idea being to put some facts behind the discussion of card selection and tactics, and aggregate testing results from people outside your player group.

Factors to address when reporting results: whether the players switched decks, how many games were played, whether it was pre- or post-sideboard, and a list of any card-by-card substitutions made from the original deck. Game narration would be great, whether it be blow-by-blow or a summary as simple as "Deck A drew the nuts"/"Deck B triple-mulliganed"/"Deck A ran out of steam after B Forced A's Ancestral Recall".

Based on this evidence, what cards were you unhappy to draw in which situations? Was there an unexpectedly crucial card in the opponent's deck? And so on.

Decklists for the first matchup, Oath vs Mono-Red Stax, from the NYSE IV thread.

1st - Austin Pollack
“Oath”

2 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
1 Volcanic Island
2 Tropical Island
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
3 Underground Sea
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
4 Forbidden Orchard
1 Sensei’s Divining Top
1 Time Vault
1 Brainstorm
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Hellkite Overlord
1 Yawgmoth’s Will
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Lim Dul’s Vault
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Ponder
3 Thoughtseize
1 Krosan Reclamation
1 Duress
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Voltaic Key
4 Oath of Druids
1 Demonic Tutor
2 Spell Pierce
2 Ancient Grudge
4 Impulse
4 Force of Will
1 Time Walk
1 Rebuild

Sideboard:
2 REB
1 Oxidize
1 Krosan Grip
2 Pithing Needle
2 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Ravenous Trap
1 Wasteland
1 Hellkite Overlord
2 Firespout
1 Extirpate

2nd - Ashok Chittturi
Mono Red Shops

4 Crucible of Worlds
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Tangle Wire
4 Smokestack
4 Sphere of Resistance
3 Null Rod
1 Trinisphere
1 Sundering Titan
1 Memory Jar
4 Goblin Welder
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Sol Ring
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Strip Mine
4 Mishra’s Workshop
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Wasteland
4 Barbarian Ring
3 Montain
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl

Sideboard:
3 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
3 Greater Gargadon
3 Shattering Spree
4 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Ensnaring Bridge

Spider Solitaire. Tetris.

I'm a few weeks behind, but this quote stuck out to me:

Steve: If proxies make it easier to quit because you've invested less, doesn't that also reduce the incentive to quit provided by liquidation of high-value cards? (Or if someone quits, they may not liquidate their collection because its value isn't high enough to make the transaction worthwhile without those marquee cards.) And doesn't it follow that the absence of proxying would make it substantially more difficult to get back into the format? As a less important corollary, the occasional tragic theft of a fully-Powered Type One deck at a tourney would also be the equivalent of a banishment from the format.

I've never owned more than three of the P9. I've been out for a while, and now only own Ancestral Recall. I would never have been able to play in the first place, or to consider ever playing Vintage again, without proxies. With proxies, and presupposing that the nature of the format wasn't a dealbreaker at some future date, a whim and some of my copious vacation time could permit me to play. Without, no confluence of other factors could make it happen.

If the knowledge of and proclivity for Eternal Magic are so rare, why strangle the flow through what you call the most important vector of player supply?