Expansion Update

direwolf wrote:

VEKN would have to establish guidelines for quality

I'm under assumption that this'll be done with the upcoming PDF cards. At least it was discussed that only colors prints would be accepted as tournament legal.

Aaron wrote:

*In other words, the price of online auctions may have become more expensive for Americans because Europeans can afford to bid higher because of the comparative value of the Euro (and Br. Pound) against the US dollar.

Not that I have solid research to support this but in the past few years vast majority of US sellers at Ebay seem to be willing to ship only to US which kinda goes against what you claim. (might not be applicable for VTES sellers for instance...)

Seems perfectly reasonable when you get burned by too many foreigners claiming that they've never received the shipment so you have to refund them too. And now you can't even give feedback to these hustlers. AFAIK the problem really doesn't exist in US since mail fraud is a federal offfence, right?

Aaron wrote:

At the same time, I'm sick of having to worry about shelling out $8 just because I want to try out some random rare like Brothers Grimm.

Then you should play JOL or proxy a Brothers Grimm in your RL deck until you believe it to be worthy to include for real.

Aaron wrote:

There are a couple of young players in LA who do not have Villeins, so they can't build decks that would require Minion Taps and/or Villeins.

Sure they can. they can use proxies.

Aaron wrote:

Why?

Because the players in your playgroup are jerks and won't let those players use proxies now that the game is dead?

I had no problem with a playgroup that said, "The game is in-print, we've bought cards, you should, too." Now that the game is dead, I have a HUGE problem with a playgroup acting in this manner.

direwolf wrote:

Also, it would put VEKN into a position to encourage copywrite infringement. In the very least, I expect artwork would not be allowed to be reprinted.

I've already stated my opinion on the topic at hand, but I just want to address this point.
There is no legal reason why one cannot print off any art they want from the internet for their own personal use (just as you can, if you so wish, reproduce in full or part a book or magazine).
It becomes a legal issue if you are publishing these or supplying these to other people (with certain irrelevant 'fair use' exceptions).
As long as vekn confine themselves to providing a guideline for what would be an acceptable proxy, rather than providing a printable version, there is no copyright infringement taking place.
On the other hand, making a PDF available which contains all the card images (or any of text, images, icons, etc) would be a copyright violation if it was not first cleared with the copyright owner.

Mael wrote:

On the other hand, making a PDF available which contains all the card images (or any of text, images, icons, etc) would be a copyright violation if it was not first cleared with the copyright owner.

What if said PDFs were for "demonstration purposes only?" (as in this is what they should look like should you choose to make some of your own)

brandonsantacruz wrote:

Mael wrote:

On the other hand, making a PDF available which contains all the card images (or any of text, images, icons, etc) would be a copyright violation if it was not first cleared with the copyright owner.

What if said PDFs were for "demonstration purposes only?" (as in this is what they should look like should you choose to make some of your own)

It would still be publishing them, the purpose of the publication is not relevant.

That said, I don't believe it is in ccp's interest to be litigious in this matter, but it would certainly be something that should be discussed with them before publishing anything they hold rights to.

brandonsantacruz wrote:

I wonder if the issue for people who would not like to see proxies is more about feeling like they shouldn't have spent the money on cards in the first place if they will become nearly free or if it has to do with expected trade/resale value. Anyone care to weigh in on that?

Edit: *Or does it have to do with being willing to pay to have an advantage in the game? Or none of the above.

Doubt this answers the question, but my tolerance for proxy use is tied to how available a card is and how relevant it is to being competitive. I'm not excited by people proxying Repo Man or Summon the Abyss, but then, they don't really need to. I'm completely in favor of everyone's Minion Taps being Villeins, if so desired, because you have to have Villeins in your collection to have diversity in deck viability. I can think of a different way to go with Villein, but it wouldn't solve the general problem that various cards get harder and harder to find.

In an ideal, every legal card would be available enough that the cost of a single would be reasonable and one could acquire as many singles that they needed. But, with enough history in a game or with needed cards being too rare, this isn't going to happen. So, next goal becomes every legal card that is crucial to being competitive in the game. Magic has non-DCI sanctioned tournaments for the Vintage format where proxies are allowed because the amount of people who can compete in Vintage is so small as a percentage of the people who play Magic without allowing proxies. It's a compromise. The company can say no with a wink. The players can still play in tournaments they value. It's only very limited proxying. It's also, typically, for just one format. Of course, Magic and V:TES don't compare well in card availability or formats. Besides the list of cards Magic promised to never remake, Magic is still going to where they can reprint anything that is too hard to acquire. Magic has formats that only allow more recent sets, making availability far less of an issue.

One could create a sanctioned format for V:TES that only allowed more recent sets, or even multiple formats. One format could be the "WW format", where cards that were only ever published in sets prior to Sabbat War would be banned. Admittedly, anything newer than that is rough. Anything failing to include Bloodlines, for instance, would have a substantial impact on bloodline decks. Might be interesting, even fun, but would not be similar at all to Magic or other CCGs that have planned set rotations. The "WW format", of course, pretty much fails to solve the problem. The problem is mostly due to certain cards only being printed in single sets and, at times, being printed at too rare a rarity.

Anyway, I am of three minds on proxies. I don't have a problem with them in play, after all, I playtested a lot back in the day and that's always 100% proxies, often just a slip of white paper with a card name on it. I don't have a problem with them in competitive play when it's not feasible to have the real cards. I do prefer that proxies not be used when the cards are reasonably available because it's cleaner logistically and fairer to those who invest in getting harder to get cards and/or when the card is not a card that is important for being competitive but is a card that goes in a deck because it is obscure.