Proxies and the VEKN

Suoli wrote:

These fall in the same category as Dreams, Nephandus, Unmasking, Charisma, Mind Rape, Sensory Deprivation and countless other chase rares.

VTES doesn't have any chase rares.
There's only R1 and R2.

Besides Sensory Deprivation was an uncommon/fixed.

Gargoylee wrote:

Seriously though, VTES is a CCG. If you don't like that fact, buy the rights to VTES and change that fact.

Ditto!

One of the things that impressed me about the first VtES tournament I attended was how "official" it seemed. I had only ever played privately with the same group of friends. I had no idea there was a community or tournaments being supported at all.

If I had been playing in that tournament as a "new to the scene" player and somebody played a card that was a piece of paper in a sleeve with the words "Pentex Subversion" written on it, and then had to reference the text from a card somebody else fished out of their stock-box... I probably wouldn't have gone back to the tournament scene. Or if a kid was allowed to keep his one copy of a rare card in his three ring binder but proxy 6 copies into his deck... where is the elegance in that?

Proxying is very un-pro, IMO. It opens up vast new avenues of confusion and complications. Many are trying to appease the hypothetical "newer player" in their arguments, but it all sounds like "I don't want to have to pay the higher prices for the cards I didn't get enough of" to me.

I have never had all the cards I wanted. I chased a few down, paid way too much to get what I felt was a decent number of them, and gotten my butt handily kicked at the tournaments with them.

The beauty of this game is that there are no true power cards, just proven strategies, and those strategies have many and varied means of execution. Newer players don't need X copies of card Y in order to make their deck competitive. They need to keep the deck simple and lose a bunch of games and get better. They can slowly evolve their play and deck builds over time, like we all did, and incorporate new cards into their strategies as their collection grows. The notion that every player needs access to infinity copies of every card is (again IMO) ludicrous.

I am all for proxying your little heart out in casual games while honing a build. As the tournament date approaches, though, you should work on acquiring the cards you need to build the deck, be it through the secondary market, trading, or borrowing from a friend.

Help me out, I'm confused -

I thought White Wolf had ceased production based on the cost/return (and their current business strategy) of re-acquiring the licences necessary to print any new cards.

Have I missed something? Have CCP/WW/WotC now said it *is* legal to print Vtes cards provided they're only *given* away as free promos?

If so, then clearly they've underestimated the intellect of the playing community! We could just get ALL old cards reprinted as promos! Why restrict it to just rares? We could have every single card released as a "promo pack" and if we're not paying for licensing, then we only have to pay for print costs! Hell, I'm sure someone could knock up a front end for the CSV to create an "order your promo" page! No-one ever has to proxy again!

Hell, lets go the whole hog and start making new sets under the guise of *custom* promos!

Boy, they'll be kicking themselves.

What am I thinking? We should just print up a promo that was itself a SHARE in WW/CCP! Before they realise we can be running the company and then they do what the hell we tell them to! (I think it should be under the guise of a political card, or maybe a vote modifier).

On a personal level, I only started collecting in 3rd ed, so can we please promo / proxy everything before that? I've got more than enough villeins / ashurs etc. but only 4 shamblers! That strikes me as unjust, and I don't want to have to trade / borrow / buy all those cards.

Much love.

B

BeAst wrote:

Help me out, I'm confused -

I thought White Wolf had ceased production based on the cost/return (and their current business strategy) of re-acquiring the licences necessary to print any new cards.

Have I missed something? Have CCP/WW/WotC now said it *is* legal to print Vtes cards provided they're only *given* away as free promos?

If so, then clearly they've underestimated the intellect of the playing community! We could just get ALL old cards reprinted as promos! Why restrict it to just rares? We could have every single card released as a "promo pack" and if we're not paying for licensing, then we only have to pay for print costs! Hell, I'm sure someone could knock up a front end for the CSV to create an "order your promo" page! No-one ever has to proxy again!

Hell, lets go the whole hog and start making new sets under the guise of *custom* promos!

Boy, they'll be kicking themselves.

What am I thinking? We should just print up a promo that was itself a SHARE in WW/CCP! Before they realise we can be running the company and then they do what the hell we tell them to! (I think it should be under the guise of a political card, or maybe a vote modifier).

On a personal level, I only started collecting in 3rd ed, so can we please promo / proxy everything before that? I've got more than enough villeins / ashurs etc. but only 4 shamblers! That strikes me as unjust, and I don't want to have to trade / borrow / buy all those cards.

Much love.

B

I must have missed the "sarcasm"-tag.
Honestly, did you follow the discussion at all? I can only point to my recent re-summary of the issue from my POV. Please read it again.

I can read it as many times as it takes to kill whatever remains of my mind, but I think once was enough. Smiley inserted to indicate tone is not confrontational.

Sarcasm tags aside, the *facts* are:

1. WW/CCP/WOTC will NOT allow printing of new cards. To do such is illegal, and leaves you open to prosecution. There is no point continuing that line of discussion.
2. Whilst most people are content to allow proxies in casual games, the vast majority do not want proxying in tournaments - see the poll running on Extrala's site.


Further, no good arguments in favour of proxying outside of casual games have been made regarding the scarcity/rarity of cards. Nothing has immediately changed as regards how or why you'd acquire cards to build decks other than HTTB will be harder to get hold of. If you need more ashurs/villein, buy up whatever KoT stock you can find. If you won't fork out for it, buy up singles. If you won't do that, borrow them. If you won't do that consider a) using alternates - I hear minion tap is still easy to get hold of, or b) whether you would have built that deck before the production cease anyway. If you won't do any of that, consider why on earth you think the rest of the player base should change established rules to acquiesce to your desires. There's plenty of decks I can't make because I don't own the cards. I'm not going to demand the rules of the game change just because I'm short of an ideal number of camarilla vitae slaves (why is no-one calling for that?).

Obviously, over time all cards will change in scarcity. Some may be harder to get hold of (from newer sets) some may be easier (as players sell off cards).
Proxying is currently not wanted or needed. There is no point continuing that line of discussion.