Nobody is being delusional here, neither I nor anyone else. We all have opinions, sometimes they are right, sometimes they are wrong. I really have no idea how this became such a gongshow of a post but going back to my original post and intention.....

quote:

---

Originally posted by gaeacradle:
You are the one being delusional here. But I will leave it to Morgan to respond to you.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by OGB:
I can't wait for his response!

---

Who is Morgan?

__________________
"Message to women worldwide: Girls....we're stupid. We don't like games. We don't know games. We can't read minds. Say it like you mean or STFU." -rockondon

quote:

---

Originally posted by chaos021:
Who is Morgan?

---

Coolio

quote:

---

Originally posted by PhillyCheeseSteak:
First, I understand economic theory and principles so don't be a patronizing a**.

---

first off.. I'm THE patronizing a** here.. also.. you really seem to not.. demand has risen, supply is short.. clearly prices are going up.. they're just ahead of the curve when they notice a trend of not being able to reacquire cards for their stock.. duh

quote:

---

Secondly, if you think that SCG only raises prices based on honest business practices then you are either delusional or oblivious.

---

given i know everyone worth knowing in that organization, and frequently talk to the people who makes these decisions? doubt I'm either delusional or oblivious

quote:

---

They know they control the value of cards and can, and do, whatever they want in accordance with that, within reason of course. And the prices on SCG are really that bad.

---

they know they have massive pull on prices, you'd have to be completely devoid of gray matter to not know, but no, they dont raise on whims. as for prices.. once again, I stated this- their prices are in the ballpark of 25% over ebay given people who prize have taken credit (with the bonus) over a check/cash

quote:

---

Look here or on most other websites and we can easily determine that their values aren't good.

---

sure.. you can always get things cheaper.. you can get soda distributed to you directly too if you try hard enough.. or even just shop at BJs/Sams club by your reasoning.. I dont see how local deli's stay in business.. amiright?

quote:

---

If you want to defend SCG for some unknown reason then by all means go ahead but I don't think you will find many supporters. Lastly, I was just ranting, it was 25% serious, 75% just a random rant about a player trying to get back into legacy.

---

I'm not defending them as much as calling you out for being dumb, simple truth of it be told. As for supporters, their opens are the largest independent circuit tournaments, their sales speak for themselves.. all of their success speaks volumes.. sure, a good bunch of the people here more than likely arent huge fans, but that's because they trade/buy/sell online in their off time.. but if you're short some obsecure uncommon that you need 2x for the open that you're paying $40 entry, playing 8-11 rds in for a big cash prize, and your local store/friends dont have it.. would you rather spend 3 days looking online, 1 day working out a trade, 3-5 days for shipping, and hopefully get it in time? or spend the $2 on site/preorder for delivery?

get over yourself.. also- it's not like you're losing money dropping $ on legacy staples.. so i dont get the whining/ranting.. your input may be higher, but you're not losing if you decide to get out of it either..

©

edit1&3: typos
edit2: might not want to post on these forums much with "STUPID" tattooed to your forehead

__________________
Since it is obviously inconceivable that all religions can be right, the most reasonable conclusion is that they are all wrong.
-Christopher Hitchens

quote:

---

Originally posted by coolio:
...given people who prize have taken credit (with the bonus) over a check/cash©

---

Your explanation of MtG finance as applied to SCG was spot-on, though could we cease the practise of using 'prize' as a verb? Let's leave off butchering English to those engaged in less intellectual pursuits, eh?

Cheers;
keywacat

quote:

---

Originally posted by coolio:
first off.. I'm THE patronizing a** here.. also.. you really seem to not.. demand has risen, supply is short.. clearly prices are going up.. they're just ahead of the curve when they notice a trend of not being able to reacquire cards for their stock.. duh

given i know everyone worth knowing in that organization, and frequently talk to the people who makes these decisions? doubt I'm either delusional or oblivious

they know they have massive pull on prices, you'd have to be completely devoid of gray matter to not know, but no, they dont raise on whims. as for prices.. once again, I stated this- their prices are in the ballpark of 25% over ebay given people who prize have taken credit (with the bonus) over a check/cash

sure.. you can always get things cheaper.. you can get soda distributed to you directly too if you try hard enough.. or even just shop at BJs/Sams club by your reasoning.. I dont see how local deli's stay in business.. amiright?

I'm not defending them as much as calling you out for being dumb, simple truth of it be told. As for supporters, their opens are the largest independent circuit tournaments, their sales speak for themselves.. all of their success speaks volumes.. sure, a good bunch of the people here more than likely arent huge fans, but that's because they trade/buy/sell online in their off time.. but if you're short some obsecure uncommon that you need 2x for the open that you're paying $40 entry, playing 8-11 rds in for a big cash prize, and your local store/friends dont have it.. would you rather spend 3 days looking online, 1 day working out a trade, 3-5 days for shipping, and hopefully get it in time? or spend the $2 on site/preorder for delivery?

get over yourself.. also- it's not like you're losing money dropping $ on legacy staples.. so i dont get the whining/ranting.. your input may be higher, but you're not losing if you decide to get out of it either..

©

edit1&3: typos
edit2: might not want to post on these forums much with "STUPID" tattooed to your forehead

---

You can boil this entire thing down to a autozone/pepboys analogy - Prices are much cheaper for car parts online, across the board. But pepbuys and autozone are right down the street, you can see what you're buying IRL, and you have the upsides of having the part NOW, along with a solid return policy.

People come after SCG as if it's suddenly a new business model, when it's really been around ever since direct order became a thing. The only quirk to the analogy is the fact that SCG is indeed impacted by aggregate sites like TCGplayer and ebay in terms of sales volume. They don't get same brand loyalty that traditional business giants like coca-cola or IBM get, which forces them to actually be MORE honest about their pricing than traditional industry leaders.

If it's the day of and I am short something, that's 100% on me and I deserve to pay for the stupidity tax by buying something from SCG or the like.

My theory is that traditionally we've seen a late year USA and early year European legacy event for the last 3 years & the players wanting to play in those events have put pressure on the remaining card pool.

This pressure in turn drives the ebay / MOTL sale price up to the point it's 90+% of price of SCG price and SCG are sold out permanently. In order to resolve this SCG put their buy price up (and their sale price to match) so that they can have stock.

To use your example Wasteland has been sold out on SCG at $70 since before GP DC and a look at eBay shows all the auctions in Dec closing at $62-65 each for a playset. SCG clearly isn't going to be able to restock in significant quantities when their buy price is $20 under the going rate (their buy price was $45) so they need to lift their buy and sell price.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Zeckk:

Don't get me wrong, I think it's absurd how much legacy and modern are outpacing traditional hobby budgets, but that fault lies 100% with WotC, not the secondary retailers.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by PhillyCheeseSteak:
Argh! Cards just keep getting more expensive, grumble grumble

---

Ok...

Everyone needs to take a deep breath and simply acknowledge that Philly's statement here is valid.

as he said, it was a rant

quote:

---

Originally posted by mcelraca:
Ok...

Everyone needs to take a deep breath and simply acknowledge that Philly's statement here is valid.

as he said, it was a rant

---

That one statement is. The rest of his rant is nonsense, which is what everyone else has basically said.

__________________
"Message to women worldwide: Girls....we're stupid. We don't like games. We don't know games. We can't read minds. Say it like you mean or STFU." -rockondon

quote:

---

Originally posted by KIP_NZ:
One of the guys over on The Mana Drain noted a trend, most of the price rises in eternal staples comes late Jan -> March. This can be evidenced in this graph tracking Underground Sea 09-12
Several people have suggested reasons for it from Holiday / Xmas money, tax refunds and the gap between Theros and BotG causing people to spend spare cash on eternal staples therefore reducing the supply.

My theory is that traditionally we've seen a late year USA and early year European legacy event for the last 3 years & the players wanting to play in those events have put pressure on the remaining card pool.

This pressure in turn drives the ebay / MOTL sale price up to the point it's 90+% of price of SCG price and SCG are sold out permanently. In order to resolve this SCG put their buy price up (and their sale price to match) so that they can have stock.

To use your example Wasteland has been sold out on SCG at $70 since before GP DC and a look at eBay shows all the auctions in Dec closing at $62-65 each for a playset. SCG clearly isn't going to be able to restock in significant quantities when their buy price is $20 under the going rate (their buy price was $45) so they need to lift their buy and sell price.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by hilikuS:
That also means that WoTC is doing just about everything else right, and bringing tons of players to the game.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Zeckk:
It's also about customer retention. It's a bit of a hard sell to get new players to "buy in" to modern when most decks are running a similar value to a down payment on a car. More to the point, the values on some of these cards is entirely the reason why the market goes ape**** when any changes to the BnR lists occur.

---

They are currently having a problem with that, but that's what Modern Masters and this new Event Deck are supposed to help remedy. Along with the reprinting of shock lands, and other things.

quote:

---

Originally posted by hilikuS:
They are currently having a problem with that, but that's what Modern Masters and this new Event Deck are supposed to help remedy. Along with the reprinting of shock lands, and other things.

I'm not sure if it's working, but I can't imagine what the prices would be like if they didn't do those things.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by LandDestroyer:
Actually due to modern masters increasing interest in modern by high number than they increased supply since it was in such a short print run modern masters helped drive UP the price of some cards like tarmogoyf after the initial drop. They were purposefully conservative in their printing to test this kind of set out. They did a decent job with modern masters but I think they were a little too conservative. Things shouldn't be double msrp when first printed like this or ftv 20

---

Goyf seems to be one the few exceptions because it's at Mythic. I feel like almost all of the playable rares, uncommons and commons have seen a price decrease due to MM.

quote:

---

Originally posted by jafoniceld:
I believe the only way to stop scg would be for an actual competitor in the market. they demand the prices they have because they run a circuit and the people are forced to buy at those prices and then other stores just follow in suit and soon enough scg price IS THE PRICE.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by jafoniceld:
I believe the only way to stop scg would be for an actual competitor in the market. they demand the prices they have because they run a circuit and the people are forced to buy at those prices and then other stores just follow in suit and soon enough scg price IS THE PRICE.

---

Nothing stopping you setting up a circuit in competition. LMK when you're bringing it to New Zealand

quote:

---

Originally posted by jafoniceld:
I believe the only way to stop scg would be for an actual competitor in the market. they demand the prices they have because they run a circuit and the people are forced to buy at those prices and then other stores just follow in suit and soon enough scg price IS THE PRICE.

---

been tried, and look at the failure that was the tcg circuit..

©

__________________
Since it is obviously inconceivable that all religions can be right, the most reasonable conclusion is that they are all wrong.
-Christopher Hitchens

quote:

---

Originally posted by jafoniceld:
I believe the only way to stop scg would be for an actual competitor in the market. they demand the prices they have because they run a circuit and the people are forced to buy at those prices and then other stores just follow in suit and soon enough scg price IS THE PRICE.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by coolio:
been tried, and look at the failure that was the tcg circuit..

©

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Zeckk:
True, but give TCG time. They have the better business model, and if MtG continues to draw in a larger playerbase each year, there will eventually be enough demand to support a second circuit, especially if modern hits critical mass.

---

they've had 3+ yrs.. at this point, you really putting your money on tcg? they do not have the better business model.. they are a conglomerate of websites and is just the central focal point in terms of web based searching, that's all..

©

__________________
Since it is obviously inconceivable that all religions can be right, the most reasonable conclusion is that they are all wrong.
-Christopher Hitchens