I've been looking over my cards and regretting having sold the money ones for so cheap and laughing at myself that I want to get back into the game. However, before I go and drop $10k on a bunch of old vintage cards, I was wondering if somebody could help me out with a simple question. Is Vintage ((Type 1.0)) still a viable tournament format, or has that died down to the point of existing purely just to collect?

Around the time before I quit, Power 9 tournaments were sorta popular ((The kind that would allow anywhere of 5-10 proxies and then have prizes of actual power)). I'm just curious is there's anywhere to go to still play type 1.0 magic, the way Magic SHOULD be played. I'm wondering this because I don't see any point in paying the money to reinvest into all these cards if the format is generally only a collectible format now rather than being a tournament format.

(edit)
Realized I never included any information about location. South Side of Chicago, IL. That should be good enough.

(2nd Edit)
Found this link at the top of the MOTL site:
http://www.eudemonia.net/content/eudemonia-2009-20010-vintage-events
Obviously outdated and at the wrong half of the country, but EXACTLY what I was talking about. Does this even exist anymore or did WotC just kill type 1.0 magic during my hiatus of playing?

That said, certain places play Vintage fairly regularly, it's more popular in Europe than it is in North America.

Not sure about Chicago... ask around the local shops in your area.

Around here, there are at least 1or 2 vintage events a month.

Obviously between the few people that play, and the collectors there has been a strong enough general demand to keep the prices from dropping.

quote:

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Originally posted by Timmy!:
With that being said, how are old vintage cards going to increase in value if their not played anymore? If they're not played anymore, nobody but the collectors want them. If only the collectors want them, they set the prices for what they are considered to be 'worth.' If nobody plays them, and only collectors go for them, wouldn't that mean they should just drop in value? Obviously the first word in CCG is Collectible. The third word, though, IS game. So w/o people playing these cards, I don't see why the collectors are valuing their cards so high. These cards used to be worth so much money because they were so powerful.
It seems to be now that type 1.0 is dead because the cards are so expensive. The collectors keep raising their prices because they want their stuff to be worth more money. Since nobody wants to pay the price to play the cards, the format dies. IF the format dies, why are the cards still worth so much money??? I thought they were worth money because everybody wanted to play them? Not just 'cause everyone wanted them...

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They are slightly increasing in price because of collector demand, not player demand.

quote:

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Originally posted by baldr7:
Contrary to previous comments, there are monthly vintage tournaments at xtreme games (in lindenhurst) that award duals and power. I also have a bunch of vintage cards (power duals etc) that i want to unload. Email me
If you want em

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Xtreme now gives store credit and not cards. Usually get about 20 people and all entry fees go to prizes. Fantastic place and well ran tournies.

Okay...Okay...Perfect start. Do these Vintage Tournaments allow a few proxies in the deck, or must all 60 cards be original?

Understandable that they just changed the prize pool to just store credit. Hard to give away the old Vintage cards with dealers just raising the prices, but nice to see that you can still build up to it.

Any other places that do Type 1.0 tournaments in this vicinity of the Chicago area? That's about an hour and a half North from where I live. Not that I really care that much, I'm willing to drive there once every two weeks to get my Magic fix back on.

First off this is probably the most active Vintage board for the US: http://www.themanadrain.com/

Vintage is still played however by a much smaller group of people. The most active scenes in the USA are in NY, NE, East Pa and Ohio. Europe has greater success drawing attendance to their tournaments. This is partly due to geography; higher density of people live closer to each other with an excellent transportation system.

Vintage took a massive one two hit about 5 years ago. Wizards announced Legacy and SCG stopped holding their P9 series.

Warning: The next few paragraphs are my opinion and speculation, I have no direct evidence of this.

I believe that the allowance of proxies had a long term detrimental effect with many unintended consequences.

The idea was this: Joe_Average who didnt own power could proxy them and play in a tournament where power would be awarded to the winner. In time if Joe_Average performed well he would own power and need to rely on proxies less. In addition he would be invested in the format and be inclined to keep it going.

What ended up happening is not only did Joe_Average turn around and sell the Mox he just won but so did many others who were owners because the attitude was "If I can proxy them why do I need them?" This led to a great sell off of power to European players and people felt less of a connection to the format.

At the end of the day people like the real thing. Allowing proxies was like a drug. You get a fast high but the contraction is far worse the next day.

/End theory

As an avid vintage player it is tough for me to explain to people that Vintage is cheaper than Legacy because most tournaments allow 10-15 proxies. The response I get from people when I say 'proxy' is a cringe.

The price of power has doubled - quadrupled in the last 10 years depending on the card. Timetwister has seen the tamest price rise while Ancestral Recall has seen the sharpest. There are 3 buyers for these cards;
1. Collectors, especially the Alpha/Beta
2. Players, International players especially have been the big buyers in the last few years especially when the Euro was much stronger against the dollar.
3. Dealers / Tournament organizers.

Obviously I have a LONG way to go being that I'm just getting back into the game and that I have basically not much of a collection left, so it'll be starting at Extremegames and local FNM's to get things going. In time I will venture further to Ohio and other more important vintage tournaments. Thanks for all this help. Hope to see many of you players there.

Keep these posts coming if there are more Vintage tournaments in your local area. HELP KEEP VINTAGE ALIVE!

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Originally posted by smash:
In regards to Vintage in the Southern Cal area, anybody know which are the bigger buyers / collectors of vintage?

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Not sure about right now, but I know that Steve Menendian is moving to CA pretty soon.

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