Expansion Update

Izaak wrote:

Dorrinal wrote:

Proxies should always be allowed at all times. Let tournaments be about the game, and not whether the players have enough money to buy and trade for the decks they want to play.

Because trading and collecting cards would be a bad thing for a Trading Card Game, right?

As long as I am unable to walk into a store and buy cards, The only way I can get new cards is to pay someone market price, or trade for them based on a market value. There is no new supply, so market value can only go up. The only thing that will increase supply is people quitting the game and selling off their collections.

SLave wrote:

Let us not forget that The Eternal Struggle is a Collectible Card Game. Gathering the cards is part of the game.

This is a fallacy. Making players gather cards is part of the business model the producers use to sell the game. Availability and price have nothing to do with skill at deck building or playing ability. Should everyone have access to an infinite pool of cards, and create precisely those decks they deem best, those who win would truly be the best.

Dorrinal wrote:

SLave wrote:

Let us not forget that The Eternal Struggle is a Collectible Card Game. Gathering the cards is part of the game.

This is a fallacy. Making players gather cards is part of the business model the producers use to sell the game. Availability and price have nothing to do with skill at deck building or playing ability. Should everyone have access to an infinite pool of cards, and create precisely those decks they deem best, those who win would truly be the best.

Right, I think that Slave may be thinking of another game where the object is to "gather" a series of magical cards by buying/trading your way to victory. VTES is more of a struggle between players' skills than their pocketbooks.

SLave wrote:

The very fact that one wants to use something should only be considered as craving to obtain it. No reasonable person is using his or her neighbour's Ferrari just because s/he likes the car. To drive Ferrari you need to first buy / lease one. To use Villeins, you need buy them first, or just borrow from friends.

What if the thing you are craving is something imaginary? When I have a copy of Arika, I do not have Arika, I have a piece of cardboard that we agree is Arika. If I make proxies that otherwise follow the guidelines for VTES cards and other people I'm playing with agree that they are what I say they are, why should that be a problem?

This is where your Ferrari example has problems. A Ferrari is a car with a great engine, handling, and a big price tag. If I want to imagine I have a Ferrari, I can do that all I want and for free. Ferrari police don't come knocking on my door saying "knock it off" and Ferrari owners would be satisfied they had the real thing. Whoever makes Ferraris would probably appreciate that I'm a big fan.

SLave wrote:

However, nobody forces you to do so. It's your very choice. I have none, and use none. Moreover, I have traded away all my Villeins, Ashur Tablets, Unmaskings, and Deep Songs. And, somehow, I still take great pleasure in playing VTES.

That's good that you have fun playing without those chase cards and it is a great feature of VTES that you don't need that many cards to have a successful deck.

Again, who does it harm to make proxies?

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Again, who does it harm to make proxies?

People who take great effort and part their funds NOT to proxy.

I play also a lot of tabletop wargaming, 40k and Warmachine. I HATE when lazy players coming with empty bases, or completely different units "representing" and "proxying" something else.

I own an extensive vtes collection, with huge number of cards and very rare "rares", but, for instance, i do not own a single copy of enkil cog. I have NEVER proxied it, "Just because i can, and it is sooo good and everybody should have it". It is the way i work. And i have never even desired to proxy it, instead i desire to have it and THEN play it. Collecting is a big part of the hobby, this is NOT chess.

although i'd like the idea of making cards for proxies, it does hurt the previous players who spent on their collection/decks. Ultimately, there would be some dissatisfied from playing with those with proxies. My suggestion is when you do make the fan based set allow a few new cards to have almost the same function as some previous cards which will ultimately allow the influx of so called "chase cards". It still has to be seen whether the fan based expansion would be tourney legal as their are or should be some guidelines regarding what may possibly allowed for the tournament scene. My two cents on the matter.