I'll address two points that have come up.
1) "Won't proxies make people not want to get the good cards?"
No. Only a small number of vintage tournaments will run proxies. For those tournaments it may be a disincentive to buying power - but most people who realy like vintage will invest in the good cards anyway - especially if they want to compete at Origins and Gencon.
2) "Wizards will never let it happen"
Wizards isn't a part of this and frankly they have no say. Type One tournaments count for absoluitely nothing and so there is no reason whatsoever to sanction them if you don't have to.
Steve
To quickly chime in on these two points. About the first point. I've seen people win power cards in a proxy tournament and plan on selling the power card immediately because they are a Type 2 player that doesn't need the card. Or lets look further down the road and theorize if power prices continue their inflation. A person has all he needs to play Keeper or TPS or MUD and wins a mox that he's proxying. He may just sell it for it's $400+ price and continue to proxy that card. He doesn't care about 1 tournament hundreds of miles away at a convention.
The second point brings me into a more important opinion I have about proxy tournaments. I'm not referring to the "Wizards will never let it happen" part of the statement. I'm more referring to the "No reason to sanction a Type 1 tournament." I think that's a big mistake personally. Proxies make Vintage tournaments possible. Or should I say make quality and balanced vintage tournaments possible. However besides the occasional look that a Wizards staff member browses this board and sees posts about large tournaments, Wizards will be unaware that the Vintage format isn't as old and decrepit as it's name may infer. I think the more tournaments become sanctioned the more Wizards can’t put up their defenses that no one plays the format.
Just guessing about numbers that I remember seeing about a year ago. Vintage tournaments made up only about 2-4% of the tournaments held. Now three years ago maybe that was true, but now I can find a type 1 tournament of some sort every weekend here in New England within and hour from me. Sometimes two in a weekend if I’m that hard up to play.
Now the real question I’ll pose is if just under 200 people is the best we can do with a proxy environment. How can the European players get over 100 people for many of their events and have no proxies at all? Is it our culture that makes us need the best of everything to make our jobs easier? We always talk of the “true metagame” thinking that’s where everyone owns all the cards they need to make a deck. Personally I think the European metagame is the more “true” version than anything.
Again I love that proxies have made Vintage a more enjoyable experience for playing. Personally, not to brag here, I have almost any cards a Vintage player could want. I can build almost any competitive deck in Vintage now, even have it black bordered, except for maybe some post Scourge cards. I look at my collection as something I’ve worked for. Now with prices of power going the way they have I’m happy. Who wouldn’t be with such a collection? Now say that theoretical situation I mentioned earlier comes up. A few years down the road were allowing 20 proxies now, because dual lands are worth $50, and power is about $500 a mox. I think in that situation prices would start to plummet. Who would pay $50 for a dual or $500 for a mox when they can print it out on their computer or flip a card over and Sharpie it? Ironically if proxies keep increasing in number allowed they might have the same impact to collectors that reprints could have.
The real question is how to keep Vintage alive to see Magic’s 20th anniversary? I feel that trying to get your local stores to hold sanctioned events monthly or bi-weekly is helpful to the Vintage format. If those numbers start increasing it can only be a good thing. In my experience many player would rather play Vintage than Standard. The average player would like to play with all the cards they own. I think ignorance is the number one factor keeping many new players away.
Ways to promote vintage. Get stores to have free play nights and promote Vintage. Introduce proxies if you have to. Then start tournaments. You’re the only competitive Vintage player around? Well teach other players how to play and maybe even don’t compete in tournaments at first. If you don't compete and the store has a good turnout get the store to sanction them. In the long run players will be come more competitive and you’ll have expanded the number of Vintage players.
In closing I still see proxies as the dual edged sword or the necessary evil of Vintage. I don't want to make that dual edged sword any bigger though.
-Keith
