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Just saw that my usual Magic The Gathering supplier is sold out of From The Vault : Dragons.

He was selling them for a reasonable £20 a pop.

So I tap up Amazon in the hope of finding a similar price.....£69.99

I really, REALLY hate Scalpers. Grasping little buggers that they are.

I used to play Magic and that was many years ago. Is it not sort of expected though that if you hold on to the cards you can sell certain ones for more than you paid?

I usually hear the term "Scalper" associated with selling football tickets and concert seats. Some people hate them, and some people view them as a counterweight the big ticket selling agencies, like Ticketmaster.

It's not long be released, but clearly, some consider it their moral duty to make a fast buck.

The greedy little so and so's.

Is worse with Star Wars Figures. It's like a Cartel. They can make certain figures 'ultra rare' just by buying them up and selling them on by one for 6 times the price! GAH!

How do they base it? Are they cards that are good in the game, or just those they haven't made as many of? IIRC there were commons ( which I don't think you *could* buy enough of), uncommons, and rares.

Same as now, though the next block is introducing a fourth class.

But this Dragons one is like a special treat really. Mixture of old and new Cards, some with new Art, all with Blackborders and stuff.

I play a Dragon deck, I wanted this, and now, because it's fairly limited, a bunch of gits have upped the price. Just glad that doesn't happen with GW. Least they have the decency to price people out themselves.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Same as now, though the next block is introducing a fourth class.

But this Dragons one is like a special treat really. Mixture of old and new Cards, some with new Art, all with Blackborders and stuff.

I play a Dragon deck, I wanted this, and now, because it's fairly limited, a bunch of gits have upped the price. Just glad that doesn't happen with GW. Least they have the decency to price people out themselves.

I hear you. Helps that GW stuff isn't *collectible* in the sense of Magic. I think that is one of the reasons I got into miniatures, you make the figure desirable. If you want a collectible, you have to make it yourself. Not that I've gotten to that point in all these years, but still.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I really, REALLY hate Scalpers. Grasping little buggers that they are.

QFT.

I saw maybe 10+ space marine codices on Ebay just after Games Day. I appreciate that GW ultimately are just after our £/$ s but a little thought towards their attitudes at these sort of events would help a lot of people out.

Might even cut down on piracy too I suspect but hey .. !

The people who will pay double for a codex that is coming out in a month are the ones fueling that. If you don't like that, then don't buy it. It's capitalism, whatever the market will bear. If nobody bought it, they'd never do it.

As for the MTG stuff, that's what you have to deal with when you play a "collectible" game. totally ridiculous if you ask me.

Thing is though, sure, it's collectible, and I truly get that some cards are worth others, not only because of in-game ability or power, but because perhaps only 10% of Cards Sold will be rare, and of that, perhapsd 1% might be the card I am after.

But when people buy up a limited edition *set* of Cards, purely for financial gain, it gets on my wick somewhat. There is collecting, wanting a full set, and then there is sheer profiteering.

Hey, Dok. I'm curious.
Am *I* a scalper (in your opinion)?

I bought an extra supply of the new Dan Abnett piece, simply because it was LE and I know how 40K fans spend.

I've sold ONE and a second will sell soon.

The one that's not sold YET was started at $10 (less than my cost when factoring in shipping). Right now, it's been bid up to $38.

The other, as an experiment, was put up for "Buy it Now" ONLY at $75 US. I wanted to see if it would sell and/or how many "looks" it would get.
to my surprise, it sold in approximately one day.

Am I a scalper for looking ahead and planning?

If you say, "Yes," you won't offend me. Only I shape my opinion of myself. I'm just curious as to where your "line" is drawn. Does it only include people who sell things that are temporarily unavailable at higher prices than retail, or everyone?

Also, why is it the "scalper" that is bad? He wouldn't sell for that price if nobody bought it for that price. Shouldn't some blame be shouldered by people willing to spend such inflated amounts?

Thanks for your time.

Eric

I think theres a HUGE difference between eBay and amazon.

On ebay, you, as the buyer, can decide yourself how much you wanne spend and bid accordingly.
Edit: hokay, obviously, that also depends on the starting price ...

On amazon however, the prices are obviously fixed. And people basically try to rob you with stuff thats not even LE.

Ive seen it here in germany as well. Regular BL books, going for over 300€, and that has absolutey nothing to do with people really paying that price.

I wouldnt consider what magickal does bad, simply because the people will bid how like. offering it at 10 bucks for startes itself isnt really a rip off. putting it on amazon for 80, would be. at least in my book.

That's the beauty of capitalism, if you consider it a "rip-off" then you don't have to buy it!

Really if it's not bread or gas or water there's no such thing as a "rip-off". If you don't like it, don't buy it.

Blame Wizards for creating the situation with "rare" cards and all that "collectible" crap for creating the situation. Not the smart people who are profiting from it.

Touting would fail if people just refused to buy the tickets.