[Premium Article] Insider Trading - Are Proxies Hurting Vintage Tournament Atten

[policehq]

The fundamental problem with recruiting new players is that you need an environment that encourages the 5C sliver-aggro player to stay in the environment (and switch to a viable deck) rather than leaving in disgust.  And I'm not talking about the metagame, I'm talking about the social environment.

There it is. I don't think you guys should be asking for WotC to change their policy until you've done what you can.

There have also been complaints from Tournament Organizers that messes are left, bathrooms are ruined, unfinished foods remain on tables, etc. Behave like responsible adults, and you may at least not become more unattractive to be around. It's already an uphill battle to get a person to be okay publicly saying they play Magic: The Gathering, but it would be even harder for someone to want to associate themselves with the game and lazy, disrespectful, inconsiderate slobs.

[Akuma]

The fundamental problem with recruiting new players is that you need an environment that encourages the 5C sliver-aggro player to stay in the environment (and switch to a viable deck) rather than leaving in disgust.

Sliver aggro doesn't usually work, but we have had cheap decks that could compete in the past. Usually, there is always an outcry from many of the people who already own power because they got mopped up by a "cheap" deck. Back when Necro was legal as a 4 of (before it was used as a combo engine), many of the Keeper players would whine when they got rolled by a cheap deck, hell, they would whine about Price of Progress, Back to Basics (I'm looking at you Mr. Tan) and Blood Moon.

Having Gush and Flash were great for the environment, you COULD compete without tons of cash. Of course the decks were better with power, but they could still be effective without it and their presence allowed other decks that preyed on their weaknesses to exist. Goblins was actually playable. The way things are structured now, you absolutely NEED all of the money cards to compete.

Other formats also evolve to keep up with the times (refer to the first half of Steve's "2008 Year in Review" article on WotC's website for an example of this, before the whole June 20th fiasco). Apparently, we don't need to evolve in Vintage, we can just do a lot of crying until WotC restricts everything and our 4 Mana Drain deck is perfectly viable again. Why do these so-called pillars of Vintage have to be Rituals / Drains / Workshops? What is the problem with it being Flash / Gush / Workshops or something else?

[Smmenen]

The fundamental problem with recruiting new players is that you need an environment that encourages the 5C sliver-aggro player to stay in the environment (and switch to a viable deck) rather than leaving in disgust.  And I'm not talking about the metagame, I'm talking about the social environment.

There it is. I don't think you guys should be asking for WotC to change their policy until you've done what you can.

There have also been complaints from Tournament Organizers that messes are left, bathrooms are ruined, unfinished foods remain on tables, etc. Behave like responsible adults, and you may at least not become more unattractive to be around. It's already an uphill battle to get a person to be okay publicly saying they play Magic: The Gathering, but it would be even harder for someone to want to associate themselves with the game and lazy, disrespectful, inconsiderate slobs.

This is not true of Vintage, but magic players period.  In fact, it's more true of non-Vintage formats.   So that argument has no merit.  Vintage tends to have an older crowd.  In my experience, it's the teens and late teens that are the rudest, most snide, snarky, and obnoxious. 

[Diakonov]

The fundamental problem with recruiting new players is that you need an environment that encourages the 5C sliver-aggro player to stay in the environment (and switch to a viable deck) rather than leaving in disgust.  And I'm not talking about the metagame, I'm talking about the social environment.

There it is. I don't think you guys should be asking for WotC to change their policy until you've done what you can.

There have also been complaints from Tournament Organizers that messes are left, bathrooms are ruined, unfinished foods remain on tables, etc. Behave like responsible adults, and you may at least not become more unattractive to be around. It's already an uphill battle to get a person to be okay publicly saying they play Magic: The Gathering, but it would be even harder for someone to want to associate themselves with the game and lazy, disrespectful, inconsiderate slobs.

It's fascinating that you consider this to be trait of Vintage players, a community that is spread out all around the country.  That being said, the only correlation must be between the Vintage format itself and slobbery?  Weird.  If that's the case, it looks like all hope is lost.

Any time you put 45 guys in our particular age group in a room together for 8 hours, it's bound to get a little dirty.  If that bothers you, you should be addressing society as a whole.

The same goes for the social environment.  When you open up a competitive atmosphere, elitism and "trashing newbs" always happens.  It may be awful, and it should be put down when seen, but it's present in virtually every competitive game.

[policehq]

Of course that argument has merit. On this forum, even, I remember TO Reports where the writer was very discouraged with the Vintage players (obviously) that came to the Vintage tournament and behaved this way. There are several negative, unattractive qualities about the culture of Vintage Magic.

Akuma - You cut off the copy/paste specifically before he says his reference was not to the metagame, and then responded to the quote as if it were a metagame concern.

Diakonov - Do what is in your power to help the game, not limited to asking Wizards to change their program. If you feel these things are justifiable for new players to expect, Tournament Organizers to deal with, etc. then I'm not sure a 5-proxy tournament norm would help in the long run.

EDIT: This is the main, recent post which came to mind while posting my thoughts:
http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=35888.msg499404#msg499404

SLOPS to:
1 - The two players who made T8 with illegal decks.
2 - Everyone who wouldn't shut up during round 2 about me not giving a bye in round 1 to the LATE players.  If it bothers you that much, speak to me directly or don't bother playing at Black Gold anymore.
3 - The individual who pissed all over the toilet and didn't flush which made a huge mess.  It took me about 30 minutes to clean it up.

As you can tell I'm a bit ticked off at this.  I am more than willing to listen to anyone with constructive criticism of how I run my events.  Please PM me with them and keep them off these boards.  I can't afford a judge and bathroom monitor and maintain the prize support .  Until then....there are NO MORE Vintage proxy events at BLACK GOLD.

[Harlequin]

The same goes for the social environment.  When you open up a competitive atmosphere, elitism and "trashing newbs" always happens.  It may be awful, and it should be put down when seen, but it's present in virtually every competitive game.

Exactly.  This is well but, but I want to draw a destiction between this and what I said before.  I don't think we should 'carebear' the format - the competitiveness is what DRAWs me to vintage.  Jer and I were joking that the person who crushes the most souls should win the event.

Because this is a collectable card game, success will always be a function of 'Your Experience' and 'Your Collection.'  The danger come when new players feel like you can -Buy- wins by just having the most expensive collection will well outwieght any level of experiance.  True or not, its hard to get people to join a format if they feel like they can't be competative without ponying up a few thousand dollars.  This concept leads to those stigma's about how the format is all Luck based.  Meaning if you own 20 expensive cards, you will probably beat the person who only owns 5 expensive cards because your hands will be 'better' on the average.  Players outside the format find it easy to believe that if the price of your deck matters so much, then there is no room for skill. 

I like proxy vintage for this reason.  Everyone is on a relatively level field when it comes to the 'collection' side of things.  This means that success in the format can only be improved by gaining experience and skill.


An interesting question is: immaging that somehow we can 'reset' the vintage ladder.  Everyone starts out with zero power, no drains, no workshops, no bazzars, and just a simple pool of commons and uncommons.  From this moment forward you can ONLY play cards you personally win in tournements. 
What would happen 2 years down the road?  Would the format be stratified into winners and losers?  What would it take to 'break into' the format? 
Ultimately Would this be a world you'd be interested playing in?   Does your answer change if you didn't get in from the begining (meaning you stumble into the format after 2-3 years of players accumulating power)?

[Diakonov]

Diakonov - Do what is in your power to help the game, not limited to asking Wizards to change their program. If you feel these things are justifiable for new players to expect, Tournament Organizers to deal with, etc. then I'm not sure a 5-proxy tournament norm would help in the long run.

EDIT: This is the main, recent post which came to mind while posting my thoughts:
http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=35888.msg499404#msg499404

SLOPS to:
1 - The two players who made T8 with illegal decks.
2 - Everyone who wouldn't shut up during round 2 about me not giving a bye in round 1 to the LATE players.  If it bothers you that much, speak to me directly or don't bother playing at Black Gold anymore.
3 - The individual who pissed all over the toilet and didn't flush which made a huge mess.  It took me about 30 minutes to clean it up.

As you can tell I'm a bit ticked off at this.  I am more than willing to listen to anyone with constructive criticism of how I run my events.  Please PM me with them and keep them off these boards.  I can't afford a judge and bathroom monitor and maintain the prize support .  Until then....there are NO MORE Vintage proxy events at BLACK GOLD.

Clearly anyone in their right mind would also be upset with the result of that tournament.  However, citing a single example to explain the behavior an entire population is premature.  Not to mention that none of this addresses the possibility that it could be a true of any format, or any largely populated gaming environment.

@AmbivalentDuck

Just to clarify, I completely agree with you about smaller, frequent tournaments being most important for growth.  I was using a different meaning of "social environment" when I wrote my post.

[Stormanimagus]

Kinda an aside here. What is the best way to go about writing a letter to Wizards or the DCI about possibly sanctioning proxied events? Who would I email or PM or mail? How would I get that contact info?

I don't just want to send a message like this to some board they'll never look at.

Is this even possible?

[Purple Hat]

Kinda an aside here. What is the best way to go about writing a letter to Wizards or the DCI about possibly sanctioning proxied events? Who would I email or PM or mail? How would I get that contact info?

I don't just want to send a message like this to some board they'll never look at.

Is this even possible?

Steve has contacts within the DCI, but I really think you're barking up the wrong tree there.  Wizards isn't going to sanction tournaments in which people play with substitutes for their products.

[Smmenen]

-I would probably pay money to be sure that never in my life will a sandwich will be punched, especially, but even touched by someone else's hands. To pay money to be in that environment specifically is questionable behavior for one's own health.

You have angered the sandwich punch community.

Personally, I think CE/IE cards should be legal, I have played against them in a tournament and could not tell the difference.  This would push more power into the market, and help people get to this "5" number everyone likes to discuss.  To the people who own 'real' power- I apologize, but if you want to keep playing the game versus collecting the cards, this may be something that will have to be done at some point. 

I was going to wait until a future time to energize efforts, but this is, to be honest, probably the single most immediately impactful  productive change we can make.   

[chrissss]

The reason I am waiting with buying my lotus and jet, is because all the vintage tournaments I will attend in the next months are 10 proxy allowed. It still means that I can proxy cards I can't get a hold of or don't want to buy.

[Nehptis]

Agreed.  Steve and others, please use your contacts within WOTC / DCI to begin a discussion about legalizing CE/IE cards.  IMO this is a variation on them including the Portal cards in Vintage.  So, hopefully it is a productive effort.

[Smmenen]

I wasn't talking about legalizing CE cards for sanctioned play.   I don't think that's very likely.   

[policehq]

I wasn't talking about legalizing CE cards for sanctioned play.   I don't think that's very likely.   

Then what was your quote referring to? What is the single most immediately impactful productive change we can make, according to your post?

[Smmenen]

Having Vintage players lobby local TOs to permit the use of CE cards in their non-sanctioned, and often 5 or more proxy, tournaments.   

[chrissss]

Personally, I think CE/IE cards should be legal,

Would that change anything you think?  They aren't legal at the moment, and already power 9 sells for 100$ /card (except badtwister), lotus for 250$, and the cards aren't even tournament legal. Once they would become legal, I think they would just jump in price almost reaching real power. I don't think it would change the attendance of the tournaments. Most people who have CE/IE are power players who want nice proxies to play with.

[Nehptis]

I wasn't talking about legalizing CE cards for sanctioned play.   I don't think that's very likely.   

Why not?

Also, at least starting with the TOs is ...well....a start. So, yes, I agree with your TO suggestion.

[mike_bergeron]

I wasn't talking about legalizing CE cards for sanctioned play.   I don't think that's very likely.   

Why not?

Also, at least starting with the TOs is ...well....a start. So, yes, I agree with your TO suggestion.

I do not want to put words in Steve's mouth, but getting Wizard to sanction anything that has the word "proxy" in it has little or no chance.  If it is not WOTC product, it is not their problem.  There is no benefit to them in any way.  At some point, we as a player base could ask them to make some cards legal for vintage tournaments, but that is not the big issue right now.  In my opinion, We need to focus efforts on attracting more players, not on improving our eternal ranking.  However, there is no reason the current unsanctioned events cannot use CE/IE cards in their tournament as legal (as long as the player base does not object) and my belief is that the store owners/organizers would benefit greatly- it would open up more singles to sell and would push more power into the market for players to go after.  I am more on the extreme side of this issue, I believe even world championship cards could be made legal for non sanctioned events.  Through most sleeves, there is no way to tell the back of the card, and who cares about gold bordered fronts...  However, I doubt many here would agree with that- I would be happy if people would accept playing against CE/IE as legal cards.

 

[Schonkreuz]

I know that I posted something before on this but I feel like I need to explain my point further. I believe that there is a large amount of vintage players not represented here. If tournaments did go down to 5 proxies what would I be left to play? I couldn't play TPS the way I would like, several other decks would go out the window simply because we don't have two sets of dual lands. I know it was stated somewhere that these people could play fish or ichorid but what if that isn't what I want to play. What if I want to play all the other decks, the decks I have been allowed to play all of this time and suddenly might be cut off from. Simply put I understand your reasons for wanting to lower or eliminate proxy cards in tournaments, I do not think this is the proper time to do though. All of these people who get to play the decks they want suddenly could not,  I would rather feed my family then buy a Black Lotus, personal opinion.  I think this would cause people to fall out of vintage, because what use is it playing anymore when people who own power can win almost simply because of that. I attended worlds this past year, I think that is a good example. A good amount of people have moxxen and other other power 9 cards, I however did not. I played my GWr deck with spirit guides in place of moxxen and I did alright I didn't do great and most importantly this is how other people would be forced to play. With decks that aren't on the same level as fully powered decks, and who wants to play in a format where money is the determining factor. Isn't this what we are trying to make sure Vintage is not.

[Akuma]

If tournaments did go down to 5 proxies what would I be left to play? I couldn't play TPS the way I would like, several other decks would go out the window simply because we don't have two sets of dual lands.

If you wanted to play those decks, you would have to buy some of those cards. Not buying dual lands is part of the problem created by proxies. I can understand the problem presented by the "Power 9", but why should Vintage be free when no other format is? You have to buy money cards to play Extended and Standard.

This leads us back to investing in Vintage, if you have invested more in something you are less likely to quit. We are losing players because everyone that chooses to play Vintage with just proxies (those that are not interested in ever buying the actual cards) is not someone the community can count on or expect to be there a month/year from now.

[Fester]

(Coming to this thread late and just gave it a quick scan so I might be repeating someone's points)

First,  I'm a casual player who can make time for about two/three tournaments a year.  I would have a serious problem with purchasing power now so just based on the level of fun I'm experience with this format post Brainstorm restriction.  If we were in a diverse, entertaining format such as pre Brainstorm restriction I could justify the investment as an entertainment expense as an investment.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that this just isn't as much "fun" as it used to be based solely on the restriction of Brainstorm.  The format just doesn't feel as tactical/strategic as it once did to me.  Opening lines of play seem much more random and it feels like the ability to theory craft seems much diminished.  To spend money and make the full switch to being an invested player in the vintage community just doesn't make sense when this isn't something I enjoy.

Has anyone consider that the lack of attendance has more to do with the state of the format then the lack of personal investment in the community?

[Stormanimagus]

If tournaments did go down to 5 proxies what would I be left to play? I couldn't play TPS the way I would like, several other decks would go out the window simply because we don't have two sets of dual lands.

If you wanted to play those decks, you would have to buy some of those cards. Not buying dual lands is part of the problem created by proxies. I can understand the problem presented by the "Power 9", but why should Vintage be free when no other format is? You have to buy money cards to play Extended and Standard.

This leads us back to investing in Vintage, if you have invested more in something you are less likely to quit. We are losing players because everyone that chooses to play Vintage with just proxies (those that are not interested in ever buying the actual cards) is not someone the community can count on or expect to be there a month/year from now.

Yes, but you also can't count on people to be there from year to year if the only GOOD Vintage Events that happen are 3-4 times a year.
Standard and Extended are so successful because they are what is played at FNM. If Vintage had a low-stakes, low-risk FNM scene I guarantee you it would become twice as popular overnight. That is what I, and I think many other, Vintage players are waiting for.

It's really not that hard. Suggest some FNM at your local store, and make them understand that, even though it's not sanctioned, it'll promote the store and help the store owner/TO grab some singles sales.

If this catches on and works, THEN Wizards might intervene and sanction some sort of proxied-Vintage format, but not before. It's up to us to get the ball rolling.

[AshThaReaper804]

Wow a lot of argument over such a silly topic.... I would have to say that proxies are there for the player who can't afford power and the player who owns it but doesn't want to damage it. A cap on proxies would be nice, 5 max in my opinion...
SCG does a good job organizing their tournaments here in Richmond. At the last event I played I competed against several players using real power and running proxies for the pieces they didn't have. I sat next to Menendian too BTW!! OMG  he was playing Growatog and battling Flash...
But seriously folks, if you want to blame someone for playing vintage, or messing up a tournament scene make it the good players and not the proxies. You just don't want to face the power of a good player, not the card you wish you could afford.
And PS I didn't read the article cause I'm not premium, so myah

[Tha Gunslinga]

This leads us back to investing in Vintage, if you have invested more in something you are less likely to quit

That's actually not true.  Having a ton of money in cards makes you more likely to quit, because it's hard to justify tying it up, and when you get kind of bored with Magic and/or need some money you sell out.  Once you don't have cards you don't play.

If Magic cards were worthless, people wouldn't sell out, as it would be pointless, so they'd be more likely to get back into Magic after losing interest.

[Purple Hat]

If tournaments did go down to 5 proxies what would I be left to play? I couldn't play TPS the way I would like, several other decks would go out the window simply because we don't have two sets of dual lands.

If you wanted to play those decks, you would have to buy some of those cards. Not buying dual lands is part of the problem created by proxies. I can understand the problem presented by the "Power 9", but why should Vintage be free when no other format is? You have to buy money cards to play Extended and Standard.

This leads us back to investing in Vintage, if you have invested more in something you are less likely to quit. We are losing players because everyone that chooses to play Vintage with just proxies (those that are not interested in ever buying the actual cards) is not someone the community can count on or expect to be there a month/year from now.

I have drains, full power, bazaars and library.  I used to have workshops but I had to trade them away when my power got stolen in college.  I still don't play.  Investment/prizes in and of themselves do nothing.  I keep the cards because I don't need money and I think I'll eventually play again some day, but right now I don't have whole days free to commit to driving to and playing in a huge tournament.  if there were an FNM type thing I could justify that, and that type of tournament would have to be proxy.

Also people seem to want to have it both ways: proxies cause low investment which results in no stake in the format AND players who consistently do well sell their power and use proxies.  In order to consistently do well don't you also have to consistently show up?  If that's true then clearly low investment isn't preventing these players from showing up.

[oneofchaos]

Wow a lot of argument over such a silly topic.... I would have to say that proxies are there for the player who can't afford power and the player who owns it but doesn't want to damage it. A cap on proxies would be nice, 5 max in my opinion...
SCG does a good job organizing their tournaments here in Richmond. At the last event I played I competed against several players using real power and running proxies for the pieces they didn't have. I sat next to Menendian too BTW!! OMG  he was playing Growatog and battling Flash...
But seriously folks, if you want to blame someone for playing vintage, or messing up a tournament scene make it the good players and not the proxies. You just don't want to face the power of a good player, not the card you wish you could afford.
And PS I didn't read the article cause I'm not premium, so myah

Saying you get to proxy power because you own it doesn't make sense.  I shouldn't have to use gasoline to travel places despite the fact I own some?  If you are proxying power and you own it so you don't damage it, that is totally fine.  If you are getting extra proxies because you don't want to damage power, that is silly.  I don't want to damage my islands, looks like I'll play a 60 card proxied deck. 

[jamestosetti]

I take back most of my previous statements about more power needing to be printed.I've been playing ichorid and have found this deck more than enough to mop the floor with most decks and r/g beats definitely has what it takes in smaller tournaments .
 Some unpowered decks may not be the coolest but they are enough to win some power provided you can find a tournament. 5 proxy is not bad but I probably think that because I own a walk and twister and some expensive tutors. Theres not much of a point in discussing reprints because they won't do that until there good and ready if ever and we all know it.

[Jess.fr]

Wow! Can't believe I missed this thread!

For starters, let me say we had the exact same conversation over French forums a couple of months ago... but the opposite way! People were asking wether the "no proxies" rule over here was not killing the format.

This said, I'm starting to think that the problem is global, and could well be concerning MtG itself. I play only Vintage & Pre-releases now (after a long time playing T2 tourneys), and the attendance seems to wane (50% loss on Shards in Paris, but that's another problem). Thus, we definitely need more *new* players, and although there are a few things to be done, there's no obvious way. For the sake of this post, I'll try to point a few of the "good" things that have been done in my country, and hope it will help.

1/ Promotion, promotion, promotion. I have the luck of working for a successful MtG magazine in France, and we had a series of articles made to promote tournaments and decklists alike. I took some time to make the difference between powered, unpowered and even "Budget" decks (decks without expensive card, no BoB, LoA, 'shop etc.). My specific aim was trying to help newcomers see the format was still open to improvement, had a healthy metagame, and was not entirely made of "oops-drop-my-hand-on-the-table-I-win" games, which seem to be a common misconception about the format.

2/ Sanctionned tournaments offer prices for unpowered decks (most of times FBB duals, sometimes T1 staples like Mana Drain, or even a P9 Mox), and sometimes for budget decks even. Another good thing is that powered/unpowered prices overlap: if you Top 8 while playing an unpowered deck (which happens sometimes, as a matter of fact), you'll get the Top 8 prize + the unpowered price. A good incentive to playing on a budget, that keeps players in the community.

3/ A national Vintage Championship (at least it was true a while ago). Sanctionned tournaments offer some ranking points for a special, invitations only tournament, first of which took place during our National Championship (in Disneyland Paris, yay!). You get points for doing well in tournaments (which must have a minimal attendance), and your score will be set to 0 after each Nat'. I think it does well to show that the format is healthy, and keeps new players coming.

My 2 eurocents.

[Mantis]

I for one, would quit Vintage if proxies weren't allowed. Being in college means I've got better things to spend my money on than power.

[DPCyric]

(Coming to this thread late and just gave it a quick scan so I might be repeating someone's points)

First,  I'm a casual player who can make time for about two/three tournaments a year.  I would have a serious problem with purchasing power now so just based on the level of fun I'm experience with this format post Brainstorm restriction.  If we were in a diverse, entertaining format such as pre Brainstorm restriction I could justify the investment as an entertainment expense as an investment.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that this just isn't as much "fun" as it used to be based solely on the restriction of Brainstorm.  The format just doesn't feel as tactical/strategic as it once did to me.  Opening lines of play seem much more random and it feels like the ability to theory craft seems much diminished.  To spend money and make the full switch to being an invested player in the vintage community just doesn't make sense when this isn't something I enjoy.

Has anyone consider that the lack of attendance has more to do with the state of the format then the lack of personal investment in the community?

I am really late to this thread (and necroing a bit here) but I wanted to say I do not feel 10 proxy tournaments are causing the decline of Vintage. In my opinion Wizards continued abuse of the banned and restricted list is the main thing hurting the format right now. I've seen many players quit because the deck they were playing, which was by no means ruining the game, got its key card or cards restricted. I have seen this happen with Flash players, Worldgorger players,Trinistax players, Gifts players and I even quit for a long time with the insane Scroll/Storm/Ponder/Gush debacle and it really didn't affect my decks (in fact it made one of them better). I honestly do not enjoy the format nearly as much as I did pre-restriction (but I was happy to see Merchant Scroll get the restriction it has needed for a LONG time) and I really feel like it is hopeless to ask for a return to the previous format because WOTC has proven time and time again that they do not really listen to players or pay enough attention to Vintage to know what does/doesnt need restricted.

As for getting more power in the environment, I would love to see some sort of From the Vault thing with the P9, Bazaar, Workshop, Drain, Library, Grim Tutor and Imperial Seal (but we all know that ain't gonna happen). 

Edit: I say something about FtV without realizing the announcement of From the Vault: Exiled considering my clan is The Exiled I have high hopes for this and maybe we will just get some more power infused in the environment (I can dream right?)!