Double Sleeving?

[diophan]

First, I apologize if there is a clear consensus here, but I recently started playing vintage again. In my first paper vintage tournament in ~8 years last month, people seemed to think I was at least slightly crazy for not double sleeving my powered deck (with perfect fits and "regular" sleeves).

I used to play mostly legacy and have played hundreds of matches with my duals and forces with single sleeves on a playmat. People who own power: do all of you double sleeve? To be more specific, what card wear is one trying to prevent by double sleeving? Presumably by using a playmat I'm at least eliminating the possibility of getting garbage on my cards from the table. I dutifully played in a tournament yesterday with a double sleeved deck after trying to deflate the bulk with books, but I was very annoyed with how awkward shuffling was.

[vartemis]

I find double sleeving creates an almost airtight seal the prevents anything, in particular liquids, from getting on my cards. I have cards I pulled from revised boosters back in the day that I played a lot with that have junk along the top and they were just single sleeved. You notice little things like black dots and oil fringe stains over time. It's not as noticeable with bb stuff, but wb stuff does mark over time.

j

[Chubby Rain]

You just get used to shuffling with double sleeves. I actually double sleeved my Battle of Wits deck for GP Richmond because it felt weird and I kept screwing up. That and Scalding Tarns were pushing 100 at the time.

[diophan]

I find double sleeving creates an almost airtight seal the prevents anything, in particular liquids, from getting on my cards. I have cards I pulled from revised boosters back in the day that I played a lot with that have junk along the top and they were just single sleeved. You notice little things like black dots and oil fringe stains over time.

Thanks. I guess my question was specifically on single sleeving while using a playmat. I have a few white bordered cards with black gunk on them too, but am wondering if that is from the previous owner playing without a playmat. The reason I'm so optimistic about using a playmat is that I have noticed the sleeves themselves show almost no wear when I use a playmat. 10-12 years ago when I played directly on the table I had to change sleeves quite frequently.

[John Cox]

You never expect something to spill on your cards but when it does it really sucks. I had an entire 2L bottle of diet coke empty on my deck and my cards were fine due to the double sleeves.  I highly recommend double sleeves.

[vartemis]

Time and the cost of the inner sleeves is nothing compared to the cost of replacing your stuff. I just use the Ultra Pro ones because I don't find much advantage of the kmc stuff when it's an inner sleeve.

I also got so used to double sleeving that I double sleeve my Netrunner cards because it feels weird with just single sleeves. The first time I pulled em out at a store, the guy laughed and said I must be a Vintage player.

j

[diophan]

I'm not complaining about the minimal amount of money and the more substantial amount of time. The way the cards "float" bugs me. For example, yesterday I accidentally glanced the edge of my deck with my hand and the top card flipped over. My opponent was nice enough to just ask me to shuffle, but if I'm at Champs and my opponent calls me out on it that's close to a game loss. With single sleeves there's no way that card would have flipped over.

I suppose I can put some books on top of some stacks of my deck again and see if that helps... I already did it for several hours though so I'm not sure how much more air is coming out of the sleeves.

[Hrishi]

I think most people I know who own power, including me, double sleeve. Some even triple sleeve...

[Varal]

Double sleeving cards is way more complicated than simple sleeving, it increases the size of your deck a lot and makes it harder to shuffle. The best way I've found to not worry about card damages is to get played cards instead of mint ones. No matter what you do, your cards will deteriorate if you play them enough.

[hashswag]

After a few hours of shuffling and squeezing the deck together, all of the air should make its way out of the sleeves and the cards won't float any more then a single-sleeved deck.

[tito del monte]

It takes some getting used to at first and ocassionally it can be disconcerting how much force you have to use to get a KMC-sleeved card into, for example, a brand new normal sized sleeve which is still very tight. That said, having got used to it now, I would never go back. I'm sure the gains in terms of preserving cards are minimal - but hell, I never thought I was going to be playing with the same cards for 20 years. If I want them to last another 20, then I think it makes sense to get that little extra bit of protection.

Also, what I think is good is, that it means your cards are never really bare. The bulk of my playables are slowly finding their way into perfect fits - and then I can just pop anything into regular sized sleeves when I'm deck-building. That's quite reassuring, plus, you know, it just feels and looks cool to have everything sleeved all the time! Ultimately, a part of this hobby is very fetishistic and while I don't go in for all the paraphenalia, something about the tactile, visual "cleanliness" of perfect-fit-sleeved cards really appeals to the part of my brain that enjoys owning Magic cards as beautiful little objects full of strange psychic energy that touches my soul.... so, in short: Go for it!

[fsecco]

I hate the look of double sleeved cards. You can't see them right, and they get a lot uglier. Foils suffer the most. Double sleeving, as far as visual pimpness goes, is a total bummer.

That said, I have never played my P9, Vault, etc, without double sleeves. And I'd also call you crazy for doing that. As people already said, it protects your cards from liquid (a rarer occurrence) and, most importantly, from the top of your cards wearing out. I've had my duals for ages now, and played with them for almost a decade without double sleeving. The dirt on the top it very noticeable.

Also, I don't use playmats, so I guess double sleeving is even more important.

Ps: oh, and the shuffling awkwardness, and the extra size do go away after a few matches. Of course the deck will be bigger and won't fit into any deck box anymore. But not so big as the first time you double sleeve them. They do get thinner over time.

[H]

I also double sleeve everything, expensive or not.  Once it goes in to a perfect fit, it doesn't come out.  This has saved my things numerous times, I've had several instances of kids spilling things on my cards and once of me being careless at home.  I have once once had a card damaged by it (luckily a random junk common) because the water ran back over the open edge of the perfect fit.  Even then, the card was in remarkably good shape, just some minor water damage.

I found that with any sleeves, some junk gets in the top, playmat or not, clean playing area or not.  That black junk will get in to a single sleeve, no mater what.  To me, this is the main selling point to the double sleeves, as my power is still white-boarder and relatively clean and I want to keep it reasonably that way.

I've double sleeved my entire 720 card cube before plus the 300 Zendikar basics for it, so I really can't agree that it takes much time.  There are also plenty of deckboxes that fit 75 double sleeved cards, I have bunches of the ultra-pro ones that you put the cards in sideways and they all fit 75 doubles in there, nice and snug.

I did switch to Dragon Shield sleeves though, because there is never an issue with fit getting the perfect fit in to them.  When I used KMCs sometimes I would get packs that would fit easily and packs that wouldn't.  Considering the improvements to the new Dragon Shields as well (flat, even, less scuffing) I really can't see myself going back to KMC (I also like the feel better now, they scuff, but they don't get sticky).  That being said, I only use KMC perfect fits.  I do not like how think the ultra-pros feel nor how they sometimes have rougher cut edges.  That's more of a nitpick though.

[TheWhiteDragon]

The best feel is no sleeves at all.  Just play them as they are - no sleeves.  Go balls to the wall. 

[portland]

Never double sleeved in 20 years, my moxen and lotus all survived...

[Klep]

I always double-sleeve these days, no matter the (constructed) format.  It not only protects the cards better while you're playing with them, but you can move cards in and out of your decks while still preserving the protection a sleeve grants. 

[dragzz]

Coming from a country where the price of a lotus would allow you survive for a year, off-course I double sleeve!
If you happen to watch those crazy wizards, slinging spell in their top-loaders, I used to be one of them. A lot of us have now settled to using perfect-fits and dragon shields

[keys]

I have all my staples in perfect fits so I can easily transfer them between my binder and my decks without them making contact with anything.

You'll get used to the thickness of a double sleeved deck pretty quickly.  It's not any more difficult to shuffle.

[jyuj]

I also double sleeve all my stuff. It helps to protect all the expensive things in a collection and reduce wear from play. When you first double sleeve the cards there will be a little bit of air space, which will make them bulky. After a card has settled in the perfect fit you can change the normal sleeves and have the cards fit snug with little resistance. I would even recommend getting triple sleeves.