General The Idiosyncratic Component Obession

[tomchaps]

I enjoy looking at the real cards when I'm not actually playing. When I'm actually playing, I find I don't care about the aesthetics at all. Black border, white border, foil, non-foil, proxy, real...when I actually play all of that stuff doesn't matter. The collection aspect and playing aspect are pretty separate for me.

Slightly OT, but the cost of MtG cards is one of the biggest downsides to the game IMO. I tried to limit the cost of my cube from the beginning, using Collector's Edition cards, or gold-bordered when possible. I wanted to feel comfortable playing it with strangers or taking it with me. However, a lot of the cards have become so expensive I wouldn't replace them if they were stolen and consequently, I haven't brought my cube anywhere in months. It sucks to worry about stuff like someone spilling a drink on the cards.

Yeah, one of my favorite things about my cube was that it was so budget that I didn't mind breaking it out in public. I don't proxy, but run as many gold-bordered and otherwise cheap substitute cards as I can find. Sadly, a bunch of the cards went up in value after Modern was announced, and friends have been kindly donating good cards to the cube in the last couple of years. Now it's valuable enough that I'm not as comfortable bringing it to a random event; I still do it, but I'm a bit worried now.