JerryLee posted:

Their official community manager came out on Reddit and said "Well, actually, we do consider a sharpied proxy to be a counterfeit for the purposes of this rule."

It's like GW saying that you're stealing money from them if you try to play 40k with plastic chits instead of real models. Which, yeah, is something GW would say, so consider what it says that WOTC is saying it.

JerryLee posted:

For those not following the main MTG thread, WOTC just doubled down on some of the stupider elements of their announcement.

Specifically, you know how some people were like "Oh, they're just trying to stem the flawless Chinese counterfeits, they don't really consider a proxy card made with a sharpie to be a counterfeit."

Their official community manager came out on Reddit and said "Well, actually, we do consider a sharpied proxy to be a counterfeit for the purposes of this rule."

It's like GW saying that you're stealing money from them if you try to play 40k with plastic chits instead of real models. Which, yeah, is something GW would say, so consider what it says that WOTC is saying it.

"Trick" Jarrett posted:

Hey folks, I checked into this and here’s what I can tell you:
First is an important clarification: Proxy cards are substitute cards created solely by judges in sanctioned tournaments. These substitutes are allowed when authorized game cards become unplayable during a sanctioned tournament because of damage or excessive wear. Unauthorized reproductions of our game are a type of counterfeit, and we want business partners to help us in discouraging counterfeit Magic.
I know that feels crazy, that we regard marker on a card as a counterfeit, but remove the visual accuracy from the judgment – they serve identical purposes when it comes to game play.
Counterfeit cards are prohibited in sanctioned events, sounds like most people are on board with that. And based on Wizards’ Code of Conduct, we have started to ask stores not to organize unsanctioned events with counterfeit cards. And to be clear, no one we’ve communicated with recently has been suspended or punished as far as I know. We’ve talked to some stores on the difference between counterfeit and proxy cards, and are asking WPN to stores to work with us in protecting our intellectual property.
Wizards wants partners in the WPN to make sure stores are welcoming environments, not use our characters in offensive images, and any number of actions that protect Magic experiences. We don’t condone counterfeit cards, and we expect stores to respect that. WPN stores are our partners and we expect them to help us protect our intellectual property.
We know players love Magic and love playing its variety of formats, including Vintage and Legacy. Some formats are easier to get into than others and these two are hard.

LordAba posted:

Company who sells cards wants to sell cards. Unless I'm missing something?

It's not like make a card shuffling device that can potentially shuffle any deck only to put a microchip in each card so that only officially sold cards can be shuffled. Keurig.

LordAba posted:

Company who sells cards wants to sell cards. Unless I'm missing something?

It's not like make a card shuffling device that can potentially shuffle any deck only to put a microchip in each card so that only officially sold cards can be shuffled. Keurig.

LordAba posted:

Company who sells cards wants to sell cards. Unless I'm missing something?

It's not like make a card shuffling device that can potentially shuffle any deck only to put a microchip in each card so that only officially sold cards can be shuffled. Keurig.

TheKingofSprings posted:

Man at least post the quote the guy's digging his company in the hole with:

Pyrolocutus posted:

"How do we get legitimate power 9 and other components of Legacy/Vintage at an affordable price such that our players can participate in events, then?"

"I dunno. Tough luck. Perhaps you would like to read this fine novel by Ayn Rand about the importance of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps."

LordAba posted:

Company who sells cards wants to sell cards. Unless I'm missing something?

EDIT: Like, what does this really impact? Official tournaments? Cause, yeah. Otherwise it just seems like a mountain out of a molehill.

Munin posted:

Also, random query about current MtG economics but is a lot of money currently made by the secondary market or do secondary market prices roughly reflect the cost of the average number of boosters you'd have to open to get a card? I understand that a lot of the demand for their wares is driven by people expecting to be able to then potentially resell their cars if needed but if they have already cracked down on something which should have minimal impact on their bottom line and helped new customer acquisition did they make any moves to find some way of shifting more of the money sloshing around the secondary market into their own coffers?

Leperflesh posted:

boom boom boom posted:

Doesn't this just make the Chinese counterfeits way more attractive? If you can't write "good card" or whatever on a lovely card and use that, then your only option is pay a lot for a real card, or pay very little for a knock off.

quote:

We know players love Magic and love playing its variety of formats, including Vintage and Legacy. Some formats are easier to get into than others and these two are hard.

LordAba posted:

Just play Millennium Blades when it comes out. Problem solved.

Ojetor posted:

Good grief. Basically, "We know a non-proxied Vintage deck costs upwards of $10,000 dollars but we don't give a poo poo, gently caress y'all poors".

boom boom boom posted:

That Force of Will game looks cool.

LordAba posted:

Isn't Force of Will a CCG?

Millennium Blades is a boardgame where you play a character playing a CCG. Compete in a tournament, and then buy/trade/sell and collect card sets for victory points (usually 20 minutes realtime between tournaments). It looks batshit insane. Plus it is by level99 games.

Spiderdrake posted:

You guys should also post the Trick Jarrett thing of him being all emo about spoiler leaks. I don't know if it's just me that found that hilarious though.
Are you kidding? A tier 1 standard buy in - you know, the approachable ground level format - is approaching like "40k army" expensive now.

You could buy full tournament lists for two warmahordes factions for the price of dark jeskai last I checked (I don't follow mtg finances that closely anymore, though)- you could probably buy every X-wang mini before hitting the same price as two tier 1 standard decks, let alone modern. They've been reprinting modern cards for years and I doubt the format average buyin has dropped by 33%, let alone actually not gone up.

Serious, how the gently caress is any OOP driven format supposed to be reasonable to buy in on when the secondary market is so loving bananas with actual in print, high supply cards? Nothing is going to come down in price when the pigs are this face deep in poo poo at the trough.

Also Leperflesh you know stores crack 40-75% of the initial supply of boosters to sell as singles, right? So basically there is positive EV on cracking ten thousand boosters, if you can reduce friction in the system by being a retailer.

Leperflesh posted:

It's horseshit. It's actually worse than GW insisting you have to use GW models when gaming in their stores. This is more like if GW insisted that independent retailers enforce the genuine-no-proxy model rule, even for Games Workshop models that are out of print, including models that haven't been made in 20 years or more, irrespective of how few of those models were ever made, how much they cost on eBay, and the fact that GW does not make any model that could be legally proxied for it. Plus you're not allowed to convert your models either, only 100% genuine intact unconverted original 1995 official models allowed in your independent store when nerds are playing Gorkamorka, and if you break the rule, we'll yank your support and cut you off and you and all your customers are hosed.

Herr Tog posted:

All right. I gotta weigh in here as an MTGO light motherfucker. poo poo is not 40k levels of buy in. You can still buy an event deck and mob the floor with fools who bought too many planeswalkers.

JerryLee posted:

Well, you can also play 40k cheap (even recasts aside) by going with a small army, buying up cheap poo poo people have thrown on ebay, and getting a pdf of the rules from /tg/. In both cases, though, you're sacrificing something compared to the full game experience.

Leperflesh posted:

OK, highlights from the GW six-month report effortleperpost:

First, understand that this is reporting results from May to November, 2015. That's the most important period for Age of Sigmar release and revenues, but it's also the less-important of GW's two six-month periods: like most retailers they sell more stuff during Christmas.

The report is not bad. I mean that: almost all of the numbers are only changed a little from the previous May-Nov period. Currency fluctuations can legitimately be blamed for the very small (think 1-2%) changes in most of the numbers. GW did not spend an inordinate amount more on Cost of Sales, it did not see its revenues fall precipitously, there were no scary numbers anywhere. GW seems entirely capable of continuing to pay its 20p semi-annual dividend, which is the most important number for its major investors; the other being Earnings Per Share (EPS), which is actually up very slightly, from 14.5 to 14.9.

A few tidbits worthy of note:
-GW's licensing revenue more than doubled compared to the previous May-Nov period. This is probably due to releases of new videogames; vermintide wont' be on there yet, but some of the mobile games and stuff. It's still under 1.5M, and I've seen numbers from years and years ago that were triple that; but the next period will include some bigger titles like Vermintide, and Warhammer: Total War is coming up soon. Overall I'd expect GW's licensing revenues to be good for a while; four million pounds a year or so per year in new licensing revenues will more than offset the quite small declines we're seeing in trade and retail.
-GW's business in most geographical areas is OK, but it is collapsing (particularly in Trade, which is sales through independent retailers) in Australia and New Zealand:

But be careful when reading these numbers. All of them are reported in GB Pounds, which means that the different periods (the columns) represent different sets of exchange rates. For example, the US dollar has been rising against the GB pound:

During the May to November period of 2015, the US dollar was significantly stronger (and continued to strengthen) vs. the GBP, than it was the previous year's May-Nov period. This means that, looking only at the Trade revenues, while GW made 8.7M pounds for this period vs. 8.2M pounds in the previous, US sales were probably actually lower, as measured in US dollars. (I can't say exactly how much lower because I'm not sure how often or when GW converts currency; does it continuously convert its US sales profits, or only bring over hunks of cash every six months, or what?) I can say confidently that this higher number is not a sign that sales in the US are growing. (On the other hand, the Australian dollar is actually weaker vs. the pound in 2015 vs. 2014. So the loss of revenue from Australia is actually overstated a little bit, too. It's not a huge difference, though.) What is important from these numbers, though, is that none of them are profoundly different.
-GW's online sales ("Mail order") are up modestly; but the most that can be attributed to the website is about 400k pounds of increased sales.

And, the Big News here: it isn't the financial report at all, but rather, the guidance given in the highlights and interim managment report. Understand that guidance is a company's way of setting expectations. The idea is, you tell your investors as soon as you can, whether they should expect good, average, or poor performance at the next report (and why). The stock price should adjust according to those expectations. Then when you release your results, assuming there are no surprises, there's no reason for a panic sell-off (or crazy buy-up) from the results. Investors expect guidance and while I'm not sure if it's actually a regulatory requirement to give it, I know of no publicly-traded company that entirely avoids giving guidance for its upcoming reports.

GW's guidance is that its December sales were disappointing.


Given the May-Nov period's pre-tax profit was 6.3M, this means GW expects its Nov 2015-May 2016 pre-tax profit to be about 9.7M.

GW's 2015 annual pre-tax profit was 16.6M. So GW is announcing that it expects to have made slightly less profit this year than last year: and, last year's profit was itself a drop from the year before. The drop is pretty small, but you generally want to see the companies you invest in growing, not shrinking.

I expect GW's investors to mostly ignore this announcement. The share price may fall a little, but GW will probably keep paying the expected dividend. What GW's investors don't know or understand, is that the company is seeing declining profitibility despite absolutely slashing costs, in an environment when a number of its most important competitors are enjoying rapid growth. GW's investors don't know that because none of GW's competitors are publicly-traded companies with publicly stated, reliable financial reports. We in this thread can gather anecdotal evidence from what we see in game stores and what people are playing at conventions and tournaments, but that's not the sort of information that investors pay attention to or give much credit.

Conclusion: GW is far from bankrupt. At its current rate of decline, it can cut costs and maintain profitability even while it dwindles in size. The company could sustain itself for decades. It is still not an attractive aquisition target. It still has zero debt, and in fact makes a few tens of thousands of pounds a year in profits from the interest it earns on its operating cash reserves. Kevin Rountree is not going to be fired. Age of Sigmar has not killed the company, and isn't going to kill it.

jigokuman posted:

That thing is literally in a T pose. I've ready about lazy CAD sculpting here and wondered what was meant exactly, but this is blindingly obvious.

boom boom boom posted:

Alright, everybody. The GW Death thread Vifam watch starts tomorrow. I know we've got people from all sorts of time zones here so there's no specific time. Just watch the first episode of Round Vernian Vifam sometime tomorrow, and post your reaction in this thread.

Here's the Youtube link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9loAdx3LYU

Leperflesh posted:

Abso loving lutely it does, yes. Hell yes. If I can't legally proxy an obviously-proxy card, I'm more likely to try to get away with a high-quality forgery.

boom boom boom posted:

That Force of Will game looks cool.

LordAba posted:

Isn't Force of Will a CCG?

Millennium Blades is a boardgame where you play a character playing a CCG. Compete in a tournament, and then buy/trade/sell and collect card sets for victory points (usually 20 minutes realtime between tournaments). It looks batshit insane. Plus it is by level99 games.

boom boom boom posted:

I think so, I just assumed Millenium Blades was too.

If we're suggesting people get the CCG experience without actually playing one, I'm gonna say that people should read Wizard's Soul. It's a manga about a teen girl who has to play not-Magic to win back the money her dad lost speculating on not-Magic cards

http://mangapark.me/manga/wizard-s-soul-koi-no-seisen/s2/v1/c1

JerryLee posted:

Well, you can also play 40k cheap (even recasts aside) by going with a small army, buying up cheap poo poo people have thrown on ebay, and getting a pdf of the rules from /tg/. In both cases, though, you're sacrificing something compared to the full game experience.

40k's rules are also much shittier compared to its competition than MTG's are but that's beside the point.

boom boom boom posted:

That's not a fair comparison. Buying bootlegs or getting deals on used stuff vs. actually buying new Magic Cards at the store.

boom boom boom posted:

That's not a fair comparison. Buying bootlegs or getting deals on used stuff vs. actually buying new Magic Cards at the store.

Spiderdrake posted:

Talking about running an event deck at FNM (or whatever the gently caress Herr Tog was mumblin' about) in the air of talking about the buy in cost of a tier 1 standard or legacy deck is just as far apart so whatever?

And no, it really is. One of them is a discussion of the secondary market and one isn't. Saying MTG has a million permutations of reasonable cost structure for good game play isn't really relevant when talking about Legacy. And Standard, soon enough.

boom boom boom posted:

All in all, I'm definitely excited to see the next episode. Here's the link to episode 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuUOV3Y10G0

boom boom boom posted:

That's not a fair comparison. Buying bootlegs or getting deals on used stuff vs. actually buying new Magic Cards at the store.

JerryLee posted:

Fair enough; I thought we were just talking about getting as cheaply as possible to the point where we can pretend to play the game at its full scale, since we were using terms like "buy-in." But I think that's a point that needs clarification: are we comparing the prices that you need to play the game effectively, or are we just comparing what each manufacturer will sell us in shrinkwrap for $XX?

Along those lines, and I think this is what Spiderdrake is also talking about, trying to defuse the claims about Magic's buy-in by saying that you can technically play the game with an event deck is (perhaps unintentionally) disingenuous because an event deck simply does not allow you to fully play the game on the level that people are talking about when they talk about the several hundred dollar decks. You might be able to take games off the people at an LGS with decklists full of planeswalkers that they don't actually know how to play, but that's like saying you can beat some nerd's 2500 point Forgeworld army with the models from a battleforce box (probably the closest comparison to the event deck, even if they cost 2-3x the price) if he doesn't know how to play them either and spends his turns driving land raiders in circles while you shoot him up. In neither case have you "bought into" the game in the sense that anyone else is talking about, so it's not that useful a comparison, no matter how much I applaud you for smacking the smug out of some nerd with more money than sense.

Spiderdrake posted:

Also Leperflesh you know stores crack 40-75% of the initial supply of boosters to sell as singles, right? So basically there is positive EV on cracking ten thousand boosters, if you can reduce friction in the system by being a retailer.

tallkidwithglasses posted:

This is the reason for why WotC doesn't reprint the cards you're no longer allowed to proxy- their largest customers have a huge amount of inventory that needs to maintain secondary market value. When they dipped their toe into revising their reprint policy a few years ago they got heat from them and pulled back crazy fast.

boom boom boom posted:

You guys wanna see what happens you combine a RG Strike Gundam, a MG Strike Gundam, and a PG Strike Gundam?

Avenging Dentist posted:

I'm kind of curious as to what those people would actually do. Like if WotC reprinted the Black Lotus, are those companies just going to stop buying new MTG cards even though their value isn't really affected at all by the supply of Black Lotuses? Seems a bit like cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.

Gareth Gobulcoque posted:

To be fair you can reasonably compete at a fnm with a $20 budget brew, even when your fnm is chock full of top tier decks, because there's enough variance and their decks aren't enough better than yours over 4ish rounds to definitively assert their statistical dominance. Bigger events, much less so. Either way the price for a top tier deck in any format is loving absurd to me. TCGs. I dunno, man.

tallkidwithglasses posted:

It's more like WotC and the big secondary market retailers have a codependent relationship- WotC wants them fostering a player community and buying lots of cases of product, while the retailers also want the players but make their money on both new unopened product as well as singles, which can be very profitable but requires a lot of inventory to make work. It's a big investment for a store that could very well get horribly devalued if WotC starts releasing boxes of tournament staples.

boom boom boom posted:

You guys wanna see what happens you combine a RG Strike Gundam, a MG Strike Gundam, and a PG Strike Gundam?

Herr Tog posted:

Black lotus is a terrible comparison as it would ruin any meta it was reprinted it but it would sell out like crazy because even someone like me would want a black lotus. Let's use zendikar lands since onslaught lands were reprinted.

Avenging Dentist posted:

I'm kind of curious as to what those people would actually do. Like if WotC reprinted the Black Lotus, are those companies just going to stop buying new MTG cards even though their value isn't really affected at all by the supply of Black Lotuses? Seems a bit like cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.