I started playing Magic when The Dark was the new set and still hard to get here, packed climbed to $5-9 because of how hard they were to get compared to Revised. Seeing those cards was a real treat.
I dont remember them being hard to find, I(and by extension my LGS) could be an isolated case though. I started about the same time. God, I wish I didnt sell all my cards. Even back then, it was a treat to see A/B/U cards, and we d get excited when someone came in with ABU commons or lands. I eventually had most of the power (never had a Lotus but did have all 5 Moxen and a beautiful Beta Time Walk that could of been graded). I didnt really appreciate the Dark at the time(outside of Ball Lightning and Maze), but I did love the art.
Same. My brother got me into it when I was 9. Unfortunately I lost all my cards in a move, but I had everything from Antiquities all the way to Ice Age when I stopped playing.
Seeing that Soldier of Fortune as the first card in the alliances pack sure brings back memories. I used to run a deck called "the shuffler" whose sole purpose was to make your opponent shuffle his deck as many times as possible before he could beat you. It was an inexpensive deck built around mostly commons and an occasional inexpensive uncommon, basically the ultimate 'troll' deck and a favorite of mine to enter into "type 1" tournaments where people would show up with expensive decks built around the power nine. Card sleeves were not allowed at tournaments back then and you were also allowed to cut your opponents deck after each shuffle so I would make jokes like "ooh, that felt like a black lotus, hope I didn't damage it!" often drawing angry responses from my opponents. Occasionally someone with an expensive deck would even forfeit to me if I was already "out of the running" in the tournament... those were the days.
I also played "back in the day" I have a 5 digit dci # and sleeves were always allowed and encouraged where I played. nobody ever played a black lotus against "the shuffler" in my area... lol
I love The Dark, the 2 sealed boxes I have haunt me and call for me to crack them, but then I look at what they're worth now and I quickly sober up and stop listening to them. 😆
1:52 _. . . and here we see the Rudy creature in its natural habitat. It has extensive experience with resealing, so it can sniff traces of glue from miles away. We see its hairy paws dexterously manipulating the pack seams in search of clues left behind by his competition-another resealing creature._
Same here. My friends in high school introduced me to MTG in the late 90s. I collect baseball cards now, but, I still have my decks and memories from the battle circle days in my buddys basement. Thank you, Rudy
The Dark (& Revised) was my first set when I started playing M:tG. In terms of flavor, both the set and novel are fantastic. In terms of power and print run, not so much. Love that classic look.
I loved The Dark....that was a time in magic that was special to me! The art and feel of the cards was so different! Alliances sucked back in the day, was another fallen empires/ice age type set nobody cared for
I have experienced myself with selling vintage packs that newer buyers to the game that weren't around back in the day get scared and think that the glue on the back side of the pack at the top and bottom from the factory is a person resealing the pack because some packs over time that get stored and then sold, the "flap" (giggity) is still attached or pressed to the top and/or bottom sometimes (making it seem like it was reseller with glue) and other times the flap is loose and unattached. Just a little inexperience and good learning lesson in this video for newer players and collectors looking to get some old skool packs.
I am a retailer; I had a box of Revised starter decks that had mixed in beta singles these decks 12 years ago. I heard about such boxes floating around at the time. A customer purchase these decks from me and wanted a full refund claiming I repacked the sealed decks. I explained to the customer to keep the decks and run with the wind that you were so fortunate to have decks with beta singles in them (half of each deck). He demanded his money back and I obliged his demand without a blink. This Timmy returned two open decks and one sealed that he purchased. I kept these decks all these year to remind me how uneducated some buyer are. I added the value of the 3 decks couple years ago. No duals or Wheel of fortune. The value of the 90+ beta singles recently added up to $7K+ ungraded. The price tag left on the deck was $50 bucks at the time I sold them. That buyer must be kicking himself today.
I got lucky a few years ago I bought a few chronicle packs, to get my full set of Chronicles. How I got super lucky and gained every card I needed to complete the set in like 2 packs I have no idea. My point is that I thought they were resealed packs cause of the condition of the pack itself, but over the years nothing can stay perfect
Actually, Chronicles is the only known ediotion to be "perfect" in the sense that buyers were auto-matically guaranteed to hit the full set if they purchased X number of packs. Players wanted to help WotC achieve this and therefore resealed millions of packs with the needed cards to complete the set. The packs you bought were likely a result of this effort and were also likely stolen from a middle-schooler's desk a few minutes before they were posted for sale online.
+Tavis King Hey Tavis, recently stumbled upon your Video regarding PSA & Beckett after I wondered if I should send Cards from the Italian Legends Booster Box & the 2 German Limited 3rd Edition (Deutsch Limitiert) Starter Pack Boxes i opened to get graded & your Video with all the Mistakes definitely put me off & i won't grade them as of now nor any other Cards i own. Anyway, in the same Video you showed a "Renaissance" Strip Mine, i think it was Italian or German that Beckett graded as Antiquities. I sometimes wonder if this is common at Beckett and/or PSA because everytime i check North American Ebay for "FBB" i always come across reputable Stores and Sellers selling a 8€ (about 10 USD) black-bordered Renaissance Strip Mine as "Italian Antiquities" or "German Antiquities" and i have to say, the past Year alone i've seen these cheap Cards being succesfully sold for 100-120 USD on North American Ebay. The same goes for "German Legends Sylvan Library" (which of course is also Renaissance) I'm sure many of these NA Sellers actually are aware of them being easy and cheap to get here in Europe but they take advantage of most MTG Folks in North America not being too well versed on "Europe-Only" Sets. I'm sure if you go on NA Ebay right now and look for these Cards you will find them with false Description & insane Price. Do you think PSA and/or Beckett having graded such cards as "Italian Antiquities" etc. are at fault for such Descriptions and Auctions? Prost & Cheers from the Bavarian Alps
The average player or collector easily makes mistakes like that when identifying non-English sets. It's common to see, and has been happening since before the grading companies were involved with Magic. I don't think the grading companies are at fault for other peoples mistakes, but the grading companies are contributing to the problem. As professionals, the grading companies should know better and set a good example for people to follow. If you're looking for a grading company that can label things correctly, check out CGC. They asked for my advice on set names when they were creating their database, so I think they have it right. They also don't have nearly the wait time of BGS & PSA right now.
The only sealed loose packs I have are 9 legends I bought from Vintage in 2016. 1 pack of revised I got from a comic book store in 2017. Lastly 2 urza's saga tourney decks. I'll get them graded prior to selling any of them.
The Fountain and the Dark Sphere were the uncommons. Is the Dark one of the sets that uses the U2/U3 classification? Or are there proper rares in there?
@@shuboy05 Thanks. I was gonna say MTG Goldfish lists some of The Dark cards as Rares but it also does the same for Arabian Nights which I know uses the U-2, U-3 system, which the U-2s are pretty much the rares of the set.
@@ghostbuster8894 I dont think so, just 2 uncommon cards. And I think they could be either 2 U-2 or 2 U-3 or 1 of each. Anyone else who knows for sure jump in
Nature's Wrath isn't a bad Commander card though, as tons of players run black and/or blue, and it's reserved list. Not very expensive at $5, but it could be worse.
Never buy old packs unless you see them open the box. These are way too easy to reseal. And yes, they can be searched. In 1994 there was a shortage of magic packs. I was going to University in Riverside and my girl friend was in San Diego... I'd hit 5 shops in each of the regions trying to find Revised and The Dark packs. slim pickins'. I still feel the pull to search for magic when i go to San Diego.
You should have headed to City Of Industry…we had hundreds of Revised boxes being sold by a dozen sellers from $52 to $55 each. I’d crack about five boxes a week, sell off all of the big creatures to new players and keep all of the dual lands.
@@Rorschachqp Awesome! I never hung out in city of industry... my loss. After a little while boxes got more prevalent... I miss getting boxes for $55... Those were the good ole' days.
It was at a twice-a-week show called Frank and Sons warehouse. All boxes of sealed product could be bought there for like $1 to $5 above distributor cost…and sometimes even less than cost if all the dealers had a glut. Not just Magic but all card boxes.
Only time I bought loose packs was at an estate sale after an old guy died and I personally went into his home, checked his documents, and saw when+where he purchased them
Some packs on ebay have a straight scratch in the middle of its seal on the top, is that a sign of repacks? I never bought an Pack with these unnatural mini cut
I think Rudy’s mom writes these letters……Then Rudy grabs whatever he needs out of his basement to go along with the letter……I got my eye on you,Taco Boy😑🧐
The Dark packs you can tell what cards are in it without opening them so why would you ever buy loose of those all the good stuff will be gone won't it ?
I mean you said searched packs look like they’ve been man handled but these could be from a box where the guy got like 9 hits and didn’t search the rest
@@DualBrainMTG possibly, I'm not 100% sure, but to me looked like the very edges of a few cards weren't mint. I'll admit the packs looked legit though, so if they're resealed, we're fucked.
I never bought the Dark sealed boxes. The cards suck. It's hard to believe how expensive these things have gotten. I sold 2 Alliance boxes. I regret everything I've sold and everything I didn't buy that I should have. Could have got mint Revised sets for $1200 on ebay, with the dual lands. Collectors edition boxes for $1000. At least I had the balls to buy a Beta starter for $3200 and Unlimited starter for $1200.
Wasn’t there a video where a “looks legit to me” sealed box of revised ended up being no rare garbage cards? I bring it up because Rudy, DC, AND OB all thought it was fine. Most packs that are resealed will look obvious, but I have seen some really good ones that were at least questionable (but still good enough) and Lo and behold they NEVER contain anything exciting. So either there ARE resealers out there so good even the industry experts can’t tell, or there aren’t and things like that revised box, packs of legends I have witnessed, and other questionable packs were legit but just printing errors/extremely unlucky. Then you have OB, who has had his stuff for decades, knows it’s legit, and has similar “luck” as everyone else. I wouldn’t buy anything vintage to do anything but hold sealed. IMO even the best in the business are getting fooled. Get it PSA slabbed and leave it.
@@Rorschachqp Thanks! I found the odds. Alliances has 110 uncommons per sheet. FoW is U2, which means it appears twice per sheet. 3 uncommons per pack means you have 3/55 chance of pulling a force of will in a pack. Like 1 in 20 or 5.46% per pack...unless you're buying loose packs from someone who opened a box and sold all the rest of the packs after opening 2 Force of Wills. In that case, your chance of pulling the remaining Force of Will drops to about 2.5%. If they opened 3 Force of Wills and then sold the rest of the packs, your chance of pulling a 4th Force of Will drops to less than 1%
I bought them from official sellers off of Amazon and they still sent them to me resealed with a bad hot glue job. Took pictures and sent it to Amazon. Got full refund and seller is still selling. Slap on the wrist probably not even.
@@TavisKingsChannel ok cool. Wizards' own website is naming some of the Dark uncommons as "rare". Either the u2 or u1 cards are now rare according to Wizards.
Yes, ever since they created Gatherer, they've had incorrect rarities for all the sets with U2, U3, C4, etc. They forced all the sets into only 3 rarities (common, uncommon, rare) instead of having all the different rarities like original. Many other lists have copied from Gatherer since then, but it's not correct. Maze of Ith is on the common sheet, and appears in the common slot of a booster pack, but Gatherer has it listed as an uncommon. It causes a lot of confusion, and newer players get upset when their pack of The Dark doesn't contain a "rare". This leads to false claims of repacking, etc.
What kind of paranoid Timmy would think those cards are resealed? Me I’m that Timmy. Selling 1/1 paranoid-Timmy-Rudy-featured-verified-pack-fresh-non resealed dark x1 and alliance x1 packs. 10 bajillion Rudy bucks
The good ones anyway. People already know what's trash and what isn't in antiquities so the spike will be small ,since most cards are already high in price .
The dark and alliance kind'a trash. Reminds me of ice age junk. I still have all my cards from back in the day. I kick myself when someone asked me to buy an antiquities case. I have mint cards but the stuff my friend opened from antiquates, umpft..I have at least 30k in cards best card is a timetwister... Thinking back when I was offered multiple black lotus for royal assassin and Shivan dragons (so dumb)..Still glad I've have saved everything I ever bought either sealed case, sealed booster boxes and sleeved cards to sell when my daughter is ready to go to college. Feels good I will make a profit. Now my storage unit I had 80's sealed GI JOES and other on card stock I sold.... Bought a house off that but ex-wife ended up with 80% the profits.
