[Trading in Type One] what are the secrets?

[Ric_Flair]

Off topic reply:  The real pimp deck master never deals with the question of Mox Crystal and Splendid Genesis OR Signed Foil Asian everything.  They have both.  And signed Summer Magic, too.  

Seriously though, I have never seen your collection, but I have seen Jeff's and tons of other people's stuff and in my ten years of playing there is nothing that comes close.

[Mith]

Jeff showed me a foil Mox Diamond (yes...I said "Diamond") the other day. I'm still waiting to see the Foil Asian Mystical Tutor.

Sorry Jaco, I know your shit is pimp...but how are you gonna beat that???

[JACO]

Jeff showed me a foil Mox Diamond (yes...I said "Diamond") the other day. I'm still waiting to see the Foil Asian Mystical Tutor.

Sorry Jaco, I know your shit is pimp...but how are you gonna beat that???

I'm actually in the process of creating Foil Asian Alpha/Beta/OOP cards myself with a very high quality printing scheme. But cards that you can't use in tournaments aren't very pimp to me at all, and that's why having excess Power and irrelevant cards like Splendid Genesis doesn't seem very pimp to me. It's about QUALITY, not QUANTITY. I'm about pimping cards you can actually use in decks, and I don't know anybody that match me there...not even Jeff. Team ECB seems very confident, so I implore you, request a deck type and I will post my version in the Pimped Out Deck thread in Community/Rumors, and we'll see whose really got the flyest l00ts. Madness, Dragon, Drain-Slaver, Workshop-Slaver, TriniStax/WelderMUD, TnT, Vengeur-Masque, Keeper, Scepter-Control, Hulk, GroATog, TPS, Rector-Trix, FCG, 7/10 Split, URFish, EBA, B/G Void, Academy, Pandeburst, Landstill, etc.; you name it, I can pimp it baby. Hell, even my Highlander deck would out-pimp Jeff's.

[Ric_Flair]

I am pretty sure Jeff did not make those foils....I have seen the Mystical Tutor and it is a real (not home made card).  I have also seen not this highlander deck, but Jeff's pimped out Battle of Wits Keeper, which I know contains more pimp stuff than in the picture, so I am not sure if this is good test.  

That said, only Jeff can be the final word.  Ask the pimp master himself.

[Mith]

They're made from real cards...not sure if they're technically legal though...hmm

[Bram]

Just from these cards I would gain: $58.82

Bleh. That's not even 60 bucks and you'd have a bunch of WB useless cards. Sell the beta Sinkholes off for as much as you can get and don't replace them at all, and keep the Beta berserk for TOG. It looks so much sweeter.

By the way, what's the name (or handle) of this Dutch guy? Chances are, I (or one of my teammates) know him, so we'll know where we need to go for some ass kicking if he rips you

[MarkPharaoh]

I have been dealing in MOTL for years, give me the guys account name and i'll look him up.  The card is GREATLY in your favor and I wouldn't trade until you know more about him.  You said he had 65 refs?  That is a pretty good amount and he probably isn't a ripper, just a dumbass.  So your best bet would be to 3rd party with someone like Dannibal/Jaz/Slinga at MOTL or make both parties send Registered Mail with the proper insurance and a tracking number.  Because if you send regular mail and you don't get the cards, you can't really file for mail fraud as you have no proof of sending it, with Registered Mail you do.

Off Topic:  Really, why spend thousands and thousands of dollars on pimpage?  I just don't see the point other then making nerd gamers get a hard on by watching you play

[rvs]

If you want, I can 3rd party as well on your expense.

[mylkhead]

Well, the guys name on MOTL is "Alexthemaster."  I actually sent my cards out today.  So they are gone.  Say bye bye.  I did however spend $28 bucks to get the package Insured ($300), tracked 2 ways (Global Express Mail and the Insurance number), and he has to sign for it when he gets my cards.  So it's pretty safe to say that he will get them.  And Global Express Mail starts at $13.50 and it says it's guaranteed.   So that makes me feel safer.

We did exchange a few emails the other day.  I told him how I felt the trade was well in my favor and that I felt weary and cautious.  He said that I should trust him because he has 65 refs on MOTL, he's traded overseas before, and he will send his cards insured and tracked.  He said if we both do that then we have nothing to worry about.  I dunno, from emailing him, he doesn't sound like a ripper.  He seems to be a pretty nice guy.  But hey, it's easy to act like that if you plan on ripping someone.

But I do have all my receipts and all my emails sent and received.  So if something DOES happen, I can either A) ty to get my insurance money or B) mail fraud.  He didn't want to do third party because it takes such a long time.  

Well, if I do get ripped.  And my package was insured, is there anything I can do about it?  Can I get the money back?  Or is that ony if it was damaged or lost?

[VGB]

Well, if I do get ripped.  And my package was insured, is there anything I can do about it?  Can I get the money back?  Or is that ony if it was damaged or lost?

Once he signs for the package, the post office assumes no liability.  At that point you can only file for mail fraud.

If it is damaged or lost and thus not signed for by the recipient, then yes, you can get your money back.

Read my prior post for what to do when you get ripped.

[Matt]

We did exchange a few emails the other day. I told him how I felt the trade was well in my favor and that I felt weary and cautious.

I hope you told him you were 'wary' and not 'weary'.

[mylkhead]

Yeah I read your "how to spot a ripper" primer.  It was a good read.  However, this guy seems to only share one characteristic with the list you provided.  And that is just trading in my favor.  I dunno, my cards are sent.  We will see what happens in the next week or two.  

But anyway, back onto topic [sorta].  I have two Berserks, one Alpha (signed) and one Beta.  They are definitely sweet.  I don't think I would trade them.  Sinkholes are only really good in Suicide Black.  I DO have my Suicide Deck from a year or two ago still intact.   I never play it anymore.  It's pretty pimp itself even though there isnt' anything really expensive in it.  It's not powered.  It has 4 Sinkholes, 2 are Beta, the other are UL.  All the Swamps are Beta.  The Dark Rituals are Alpha.  Everything else in the deck is mediocre pimpness.  

My old school red/green deck is moderately pimped.  4 Lightning Boltz, 2 Alpha, 2 Beta.  4 Kird Apes, Arabian Nights.  1x Beta Regrowth.  4x Chain Lightninngs.  2x Berserk Alpha/Beta, 4x Blood Lust Legends.  That's about it.  

But more on topic, some have said that it's more important to get the cheapest playable version of the card.  You get more bang for your buck that way.  But a friend of made a good point.  There is a small intangible plus when playing with PIMP cards.  Your opponent might get a little intimidated when you play your entire Alpha/Beta/DCI Foil deck.  It may not be good, but the opponent will assume you are a long time player of Magic with a lot of experience and skill.  And they might make mistakes because they feel that their moves are subpar to yours.  

This may or may not be true, however, but I do recall feeling a little intimdated against older players who have all of those uber sweet pimped out decks.  If they own a set of power as well as playsets of all the teir two power and lots of foil/dci/promo/forein versions of their cards it makes you feel like a scrub.  Haha.

[MarkPharaoh]

But a friend of made a good point. There is a small intangible plus when playing with PIMP cards. Your opponent might get a little intimidated when you play your entire Alpha/Beta/DCI Foil deck.

That will only work on weak players so in the early rounds it might help but once you make Top8 in a Power tourney or something it won't matter what your cards look like.  I don't think it's worth it, you might scare a few little kids but you should already beat them, pimped cards or not.  I personally always went moderately pimped so all my decks are mostly Japanese/S-Chinese which doesn't cost you a lot more then regular cards but things like BB Power/OOPs and Asian Foils is just silly IMO.

[skecreatoR]

Anyone, pictures of a Mox Crystal, please?

I think the battle between JACO and SamiteHealer is getting way out of hand. They should just post their entire list of cards ans we could work it out that way.

They do have different oppinions on what is pimp, so obv. people will consider their lists in different lights. Where JACO have the DECKS Samite have the CARDS.

But damnit people, BRING IT ON!

[HuntedWumpus]

JACO will P0wn yee all.

Mad props for JACO and the Pepsi Challenge line.

On topic, I too am in the process of selling alot of My Foil and Beta pimpness to get some cash to invest in power and big cards. The eye candy is fairly easy to sell especially if your local market has alot of "pimp'ed" out players. I ALWAYS use ebay as my last resort for buying and selling. Check your local market first.

[mrieff]

Some bad news for mylkhead

http://www.magictraders.com/ubb/Forum13/HTML/011416.html

Your guy seems to act suspiciously... I've never seen a MOD makes such an announcement on MOTL outside the Bad Traders forum.

[whitepanther]

There can be no competition, Jeff Anad owns everything JACO does and more...

[johnstown713]

Going back on topic.  I am sorry to hear about the difficulties others are having with this person.  Please let us know what happens with your transaction so the rest of the community will be aware.  Good luck.

Johnstown713

[dicemanx]

Some bad news for mylkhead

http://www.magictraders.com/ubb/Forum13/HTML/011416.html

Your guy seems to act suspiciously... I've never seen a MOD makes such an announcement on MOTL outside the Bad Traders forum.

While the bad news is that this guy was on the BTA, the good news is that he was willing to work things out and not get banned. That's encouraging at least.

For the future, I'd recommend third party only on very large deals. In the meantime, build up your refs through small deals, while making slightly larger deals with moderators and other traders with high feedback.

[zero]

Yeah, I'm pretty suspicious of Alexthemaster myself. Note he has 65 refs, but only 11 MOTL refs (yeah, I'm a suspicious bastard). Here is the trade we agreed on yesterday, and I told him it had to go through a moderator in belgium. If he's a ripper, he'll say no; mail from belgium to the netherlands is like mailing from NY to NJ, they're next door to each other, he's not going to wait weeks to get my cards.
I'd be getting the pile with a lotus, but I sure as shit will not risk getting ripped; don't ever trade with someone who refuses a moderator. What if this is an old account that got hacked, and is now being used for high value offers?

1x Black Lotus UNL NM-
3x Illusionary Mask 03 BETA NM
1x Library of Alexandria NM
1x Underground Sea 01 BETA
2x Volcanic Island 02 BETA
1x Tropical Island 01 Beta
1x Tundra 01 Alpha
3x Taiga 03 Beta
For
4x Illusionary Mask
2x Bazaar of Baghdad (NM-, FN)
2x Mishra's Workshop (EX-, GD)
1x Beta Serra Angel, signed (EX+)
2x Nether Void (NM)
2x Beta Berserk (EX)
2x Power Artifact (NM-)
1x Moat (EX+/NM-)
1x The Abyss (NM-)
1x Mirror Universe (NM-)
1x Beta Copy Artifact (NM)
4x Mana Drain (FN)
1x Mox Sapphire (FN)
2x Fire/Ice (foil)

[Tha Gunslinga]

Damn it, use a third party, don't waste your money on global priority whatever.  I'm available for any and all third parties, and I don't charge much, and yes, I'm the same guy on MOTL.

Back to the topic at hand:  Trading for Type 1.

I started playing Magic around Apocalypse, so a few years back.  It took me at least a year or so to even own cards such as duals or Scrolls, and I only had a few of them.  Now I have pretty much everything: P9, Library, Shops, Bazaars, double dual playset, etc.  Plus a minor amount of pimpage: foil Asian Future Sight, 1000+ foils (mostly unplayable), a few Betas, etc.  How'd I do it?

Simple.  I paid.  I bought low, sold at market price or higher, and almost never paid market value for anything.  I traded like a madman, and made sure I knew what cards were worth.  That's the number one thing:

KNOW YOUR VALUES.  Ebay values, not Inquest, Beckett's, Scrye, or whatever.  Ideally, know WHY a card is worth what it is.  Why is a foil Welder worth a Chains and a Morphling?  Because Welder is hotter than those two cards combined, and foil Legacy cards are hellishly hard to find.

Anyway, check people out before dealing with them, and if you're doing anything over $100, use a third party.  If it's in the US and it's worth $40+, send insured.  Insurance is cheap and reliable.  Sell your bulk stuff on Ebay, and always try to trade your extra commons/uncommons into rares, even if they're just small ones.  Last, but not least, don't waste your money on packs.  Ever.


[edit] By the way, the EssentialMagic thing is totally wrong.

f) Has poor verbal skills and displays lots of misspellings and grammatical errors; good literacy is an indication of good breeding.

This applies to half the people on the net, if not more.

e) Has satanic/vulgar/suggestive screen names (wrathofsatan, jimmy666, f_off_yall, BigRichardHead, etc.). This is another psychological indicator; rippers will often give clues that they are rippers, because they have a sense of superiority and consider anyone foolish enough to succumb to their ploys deserving of getting ripped.

As does this.  If I banned all the people on MOTL who had "69" or "420" in their username or email, we'd have no one left.

If you suspect someone is a ripper, simply inform them you want to do a third party trade or want them to send first; a ripper will *always* back out.

This, however, is a good idea.  As a third party, I've had to send cards back before (and ban people) because one party didn't send, then decided to stop returning emails.

[Mith]

In addition to Tha Gunslinga's comment:

Figure out what's going to be hot, and buy it. When Brainstorm started popping up in EVERY tier 1 deck, I bought foil ones by the stack. I think the most I paid was $5 a piece. I did the same with Mana Crypts. If you see a card that is seeing a LOT of play (this theory only really works for foils and older OOPs) pick them up before they start to skyrocket in price. I remember when foil Metalworkers were $5 cards...now they fetch over $20 a piece. Foil Goblin Welders are the same. I picked up FBB dual lands when the first came out for $15 a piece. Sure that was twice what Revised ones were worth at the time, but I had a feeling that they were going to be hot. Now, FBB duals are selling between $40-50, with Underground Seas fetching even more. When Illusionary Masks got hot, I called up every "middle-of-nowhere" store and bought up masks at $10-20 a piece. Did the same with Berserk as soon as word got out it was being unrestriced.

And what did I do with all the money I made? I bought BETA cards...power, duals, etc. I picked up Beta Duals at $50-75 a piece, and Beta power at $200-250  a piece. And now Beta cards have REALLY gone up in value (duals fetching $100+ and Power fetching three to four hundred a piece. Why did I buy Beta? Because it was a MUCH smaller run than the newer sets, so it only makes sense that the cards should continue to increase in value. Now the money I initially paid has at least quintupled (if not more). Betas, foils...they're collector's items: they will continue to increase in value as time passes because there are smaller amounts of them to go around. Plus, my collection is now pimped out in foil and Beta, which is always a good thing.

Cards like a foil Standstill...if fish keeps being so popular (and it will be)...that cards HAS to go up in value. The same goes for foil Dazes, or Faerie Conclaves. Check the onlune retailers...most are sold out of these cards. And you rarely see these cards sitting in binders. So what does that mean? Everyone who wants them has to either search all over trading sites like MOTL, or has to fight in bidding wars on Ebay (the most convenient way).

Now this theory isn't always true (look at poor Morphling, or Stroke of Genius). Cards that are hot now will not always see the light of day. Heck, if they every restrict Bazaar or Workshop (unlikely), those cards wouldn't be worth more than $20 or so a piece. But in general, cards that are hot and versatile (FoW, Brainstorm, Standstill, etc) should continue to go up in value each month.

[VGB]

By the way, the EssentialMagic thing is totally wrong.

f) Has poor verbal skills and displays lots of misspellings and grammatical errors; good literacy is an indication of good breeding.

This applies to half the people on the net, if not more.

What I forgot to mention about this list is that it has been aggregated over a couple of years from the information obtained on all the rippers that have appeared on EssentialMagic.  Since I posted this "tutorial", ripping has substantially diminished in the trade forum.

Of course the points I make are not absolutes, but rather an indicator of the potential for somebody to be a ripper.  Regarding this particular point, many rippers are juveniles and simply lack sufficient education to exhibit good grammar and spelling - and a lot of rippers I have tracked down are just stupid adults, too.  I mean, come on, ripping off Magic cards in internet trades?  Sure, it's easy, but how lucrative can it be?  The smart rippers use Ebay, at least - there I've often seen Dutch and lottery auctions pull in thousands of dollars where all people got were boxes full of commons and other crap, if they got anything.  There's whole rings of people involved in card lottery scams.

e) Has satanic/vulgar/suggestive screen names (wrathofsatan, jimmy666, f_off_yall, BigRichardHead, etc.). This is another psychological indicator; rippers will often give clues that they are rippers, because they have a sense of superiority and consider anyone foolish enough to succumb to their ploys deserving of getting ripped.

As does this.  If I banned all the people on MOTL who had "69" or "420" in their username or email, we'd have no one left.

Just reporting what I see.  Another warning sign, but by no means am I suggesting that all offensive screen names are suspect.

By the way, all those screen names were used by rippers on EM.

[Bram]

mail from belgium to the netherlands is like mailing from NY to NJ, they're next door to each other, he's not going to wait weeks to get my cards.

Erm...not quite true. A little while ago I ordered some cards from a Dutch online store while at the same time ordering some card with Michael French. The cards from Osaka, Japan arrived before the cards from Amsterdam did. Holland has a horrible postal service. Add to that the fact that the Belgian postal service operates completely separate from the Dutch one and the fact that it's most likely more shoddy than the Dutch one, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if it takes a couple of days to arrive. Not more than a week though, no.

[Addolorisi]

I'm a fairly paranoid person...and I recently started wondering if my local shop is selling counterfeit cards. :sweat:

Elucidate.  What aroused your suspicions?

Sorry for the late reply, I haven't been online lately.

First, when a friend and I bought some stuff (Shops plus a few Beta versions of cards) he insisted that we pay cash. On singles purchases, he won't charge tax if you pay cash. This is an overall shady business alert which may or may not have anything to do with fraud.

Card thickness. Please, if someone can help me out with this, I'd be most appreciative as it's the part I'm most unsure of. A lot of cards seem to be thinner, and so I tried looking at the edges for a bit of blue (comparing to thicker versions), but couldn't come up with results. And I didn't want to try ripping them in half to see. This seems to happen with both older and newer cards, so I'm wondering if it may have anything to do with print runs. Trying to find a card that I know I got from him and a copy of the same card that I got from someplace reputable has been difficult.

Card prices. Just a few notables here.
MisD's for $6
Intuitions for $5
any dual for $12
Worskhops for $75 (we bought all 4 he had, then a few weeks later he said he found out they were selling for $150)
Beta moxen for $200. (He only had Emerald and Sapphire left, because he said he Ebayed the rest.)

For someone with an Ebay account, he doesn't seem to know his card values well enough. I've been meaning to ask him for his ebay username to check out his feedback and sales history, but I haven't seen him lately.

Like I said, I may be overly paranoid, but with his cash and sales tax thing, plus the fact that he plays in all the weekly tournaments (and I've caught him cheating), I just get a huge bad vibe from him.

[VGB]

Card thickness. Please, if someone can help me out with this, I'd be most appreciative as it's the part I'm most unsure of. A lot of cards seem to be thinner, and so I tried looking at the edges for a bit of blue (comparing to thicker versions), but couldn't come up with results. And I didn't want to try ripping them in half to see. This seems to happen with both older and newer cards, so I'm wondering if it may have anything to do with print runs. Trying to find a card that I know I got from him and a copy of the same card that I got from someplace reputable has been difficult.

Perhaps the best fraudulent card scam is the one where someone takes 2 cards (1 being an Unlimited common and the other being the target card in CE), splits both the cards in half (takes a lot of practice to do this well, but once you get the hang of it, Magic cards actually split rather easily), and then pastes the CE front onto the Unlimited back, and then crops the CE square corners.

About the only way to detect this fraud is microscopic inspection of the side of the card.  Simply compare what you see on the suspect against any card from the "same" set.  It's usually pretty easy to see the line between the layers.  These cards usually don't have uniform thickness, either, while real cards do (although sanding the backs alleviates this disparity, human hands are not nearly exact enough to peel cards apart perfectly).

Other fraudulent card scams involve using high resolution scanners and printers (such as those used to print magazines) to print over card stock where the face was sanded off with high grit sandpaper (500+) or simply peeled off in the case of a foil card, which leaves a blank white face.  To detect these fakes requires microscopic inspection as well - you don't necessarily need the exact same card, just another one from the same set so you can inspect the ink dot pattern on the face and how they overlay/are spaced with respect to each other.  Sometimes it's just simply a matter of whether the finish on the card matches that of a real card (glossy/matte).

[mylkhead]

Well the tracking on my package said that it was delivered on 07/21/04 at 11:50am.  But ever since I told him that I sent out my cards, he has not responded.  I emailed him once after the delivery of the cards, but no reply.  I also emailed him again about 4 or 5 days later just asking him to reply and tell me he got my cards and that he sent out.  But still nothing.  And it's July 28th.  

So it's been a week since he got my cards, but he is not responding.  He didn't have a problem emailing before I sent my cards.  He would respond very quickly, and sometimes 3 times a day.  

I am wondering when we should take action?

[Jacob Orlove]

Sounds like you got ripped.

[Bram]

Could you be more specific on this guy's data (real name, shipping adress and such)? Since he's dutch there's a decent chance I'll run in to him over a trade sometime and I like to know who I'm dealing with. Also, I'd like to post him on the ISP forums (and possibly Nedermagic.nl)

[mylkhead]

Here we go:

Real Name:  Alex (Jackal?)
I don't know his last name, but this was his last name on the BTA on MOTL...sounds kinda fishy if you ask me.

Link to his BTA thread on MOTL:
http://www.magictraders.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/003278.html

Link to his H/W list on MOTL:
http://www.magictraders.com/ubb//Forum2/HTML/184092.html

Link to his MOTL profile:
http://forums.magictraders.com/ubbmisc.cgi?action=getbio&UserName=Alexthemaster

MOTL name:  Alexthemaster
Email:  meehmahselfnd1@hotmail.com

Link to his MOTL reference page:
http://refs.magictraders.com/Alexthemaster.html
---note that it NOW says the user has been BANNED after I had already sent my cards out.

Here is the address he gave me to ship to:

AS Ausems
Massenetstraat 26
5144 WR Wolluk
The Netherlands