Expansion Update

Pendargon wrote:

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Again, who does it harm to make proxies?

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

No, it really doesn't.

I have a lot of cards, I don't use proxies, if they were made tournament legal I probably still wouldn't use them (even though I don't have any of certain really good cards). But that's just me.
If proxies were to be made legal I would still have just as many cards as I currently do, I could still make all the same decks as I currently can, I would still see decks at tournaments using cards I simply don't have. None of that will change.

It will however make the game easier to get into for new players.
There are currently a number of different barriers to entry for new players, none of us should be under any illusions to the contrary. The fact that the only way to get cards is by ordering them online is a major one. Many times when I've been talking about the game to potential new players, they ask where it's available, and on hearing that they just lose interest.
If someone is interested in the background and the general concept, they will be amenable to learning an arcane rules system (and accepting my word on how things work until they have learned it). Roleplayers and boardgamers already spend over 2 hours on games quite frequently. But on top of that, they can currently only get the components to play the game by buying in bulk or from overseas.

The only people who are hurt by making proxies legal are the current publisher of the game (of which there isn't one), and in the short term, resellers and potential future publishers. In the long term allowing proxies is of benefit to resellers and potential future publishers as it helps to keep a market in place for their product.

Izaak wrote:

I presume you also believe you don't have 100 dollars, but instead have a piece of paper that we agree is 100 dollars?

Unrelated side note, but that's exactly what modern money is.
There is no intrinsic worth in a $100 bill, it is only by shared consensus that we agree to treat it as if though it had value. If it had any intrinsic value then it would not be as easy for economies to collapse the way they did recently.

Lönkka wrote:

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Again, who does it harm to make proxies?

Been through this previously, but the biggest thing most certainly is the marketability of the game for the next publisher.

"Please pick up the game. Don't mind the fact that no player actually needs to buy any of your new products, or reprints, since you can proxy all you like in VTES nowadays. lol"


You wanna proxy cards in friendly games? -go ahead and have a blast!
You wanna do the same in official tournaments? -error 404

But it also a very simple matter to say "Dear Playerbase of the VEKN, your game is now being officially produced by people seeking to make money from it. Consequently, using your own printed proxy cards is now illegal in tournament play."

I'm sure most of us realise that DIY Cards would always be about making the game accessible in the Torpor Period.

Juggernaut1981 wrote:

Lönkka wrote:

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Again, who does it harm to make proxies?

Been through this previously, but the biggest thing most certainly is the marketability of the game for the next publisher.

"Please pick up the game. Don't mind the fact that no player actually needs to buy any of your new products, or reprints, since you can proxy all you like in VTES nowadays. lol"


You wanna proxy cards in friendly games? -go ahead and have a blast!
You wanna do the same in official tournaments? -error 404

But it also a very simple matter to say "Dear Playerbase of the VEKN, your game is now being officially produced by people seeking to make money from it. Consequently, using your own printed proxy cards is now illegal in tournament play."

I'm sure most of us realise that DIY Cards would always be about making the game accessible in the Torpor Period.

Exactly. With the stroke of a pen proxies can be made legal. Similarly, they can be made illegal when/if some chooses to pick up the game and print it for money. I don't see how having proxies in between publishers devalues the game or the intellectual property, however you look at it.

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Exactly. With the stroke of a pen proxies can be made legal. Similarly, they can be made illegal when/if some chooses to pick up the game and print it for money. I don't see how having proxies in between publishers devalues the game or the intellectual property, however you look at it.

Agreed 100%.

Disclaimer: I am totally against allowing for Proxies of cards that are still available in boosters.
There is one thing people didn't mention: that would make our Tournament Prizes completely worthless, therefore Tournaments less interesting.
We don't want that.

A question to all of you that claim that legalizing proxies (just during the time we don't have a publisher) would make it less likely to get a new publisher:

Shouldn't the number of active players be the most important factor to "sell" the game to a publisher?
If you think yes, why shouldn't we pass legislation that would include more players in our ranks?