Why Proxying is Good and Cool, Actually | Feat. Sheepwave | Magic: The Gathering Explained 

LETSGOOOO HEY SPICE8RACK DID YOU NOTICE THAT THE ARTIST SHEEPWAVE GAVE YOU A VERSION OF GAEA'S CRADLE THAT HAS A TYPO SHS BAD AND SHOULD FEEL BAD

Outside of an official tournament setting, not letting people play with proxies is basically saying that they dont want to fight your skill they want to fight your wallet.

Broke: Building a Commander deck with 37 matching basic lands. Woke: Building a Commander deck with 100 matching basic lands and a sharpie.

"An actual magic card is a proxy of the actual rules object that it is supposed to represent" Truer words were never spoken.

25:28 "What are they gonna do, call the card police?" Well, they have shown they are not above calling the Pinkertons.

Proxy's Bizarre Adventure: Spicy Tendency

Arguing that a real Magic card is a proxy "of the rules object it represents" is such Platonism and I am HERE FOR IT.

Is it really "theft" if you "steal" a product that isn't being produced anymore by its original creator, because that creator was bullied by a bunch of people into creating an artificial scarcitiy of that product, so that these people don't have to feel bad about spending hundreds of dollars on singular pieces of cardboard? Great content as always.

I feel like anti proxy mentality mostly stems from the players that bought the money cards, and don't want some kid to roll up with a copy of his $20,000 deck (idk magic prices, I'm a casual observer lol) that cost 5 cents to proxy. Like the type of people that don't want student debt wiped because they had to pay theirs

I had a friend who made an eldrazi commander deck, but he didnt have access to any wastes so we just agreed that all the swamps in the deck were wastes

Back in 96 or so my buddy got the first color printer we ever saw. His dad got soooo mad when we used all the ink in two days printing proxies 🤣 🤣

This “D” guy sounds like he’s lots of fun at parties.

As a magic judge, one of the things that judges do that I think a lot of people aren't really aware of, is help foster communities of magic players. It's refreshing to hear someone talk about proxying being part of the message that you send to stores and other players. Thank you for this video

Im not paying 50$ for some card stock and ink because a greedy corporation refuses to reprint said cardstock for the sake of having collectors feel like they are important

Actually, there are people who should come into your work place and tell you how to do your job: Safety Inspectors

When you said it was a "spite" video I was expecting it to just be about why you should give Wizards as little money as possible, which is still a perfectly understandable take considering the state of the game the past few years.

Official Magic: the Gathering Card is Smothering Tithe, fucking epic!

Not gonna lie, I misread as "Why Phyrexian is good and cool, actually." and was confused for far longer than I should.

I love how when I see proxies I think about the fancy plastic diamonds you see in decorations, and it's funnier to imagine someone getting mad about an obviously fake diamond

You convinced me to print a Black Lotus just to see if I could. Literally inkjet printer glued to an island. It's marvelous.

It’s now canon that Spice always carries a knife on his lap

Smothering Tithe was an inspired choice for the official card.

There is also the situation of cards being too expensive to feasibly carry them around with you. I have a time twister and a candelabra in my cedh high tide deck, but I keep those in a safe place in my home, and use a proxy in my deck, as there has been issues of theft at the shop before.

Megan's point (10:53) about about how you can argue that, technically, even official Magic cards can be considered proxies since they are standing in for the "rules object" that it represents is SO MINDBLOWING!!!

"This is a high-production spite video" 30 seconds into the video and my expectations are already met - merry Christmas, Spice!

I remember you sharing a video from another content creator about how expensive cards are a way that edh players gatekeep regularly a while ago, and I'm glad that you decided to take a look into the discussion yourself!

I love how this should've been a spite video and instead it was an exahustive explanation of the topic, a collaborative video and a showcase of some really good artists' work. Merry Christmas Spiceman!

I have always shied away from proxying because I like the challenge of working within a budget and not using "powerful"/overly expensive cards. I never realized that using tokens is actually a form of proxying. Great informative video.

A lot of times my playgroup proxies cards to see how they flow with the deck if they wanna make a change before committing to the purchase.

"What are they gonna do? Call the card police?" Little did we know

24:30 "Good lord this is a child's card game, what's going on here?" I lost it, lmao

This is absolutely brilliant, I'm beginning to think that you just can't make a bad video. Happy holidays spice

I just got an entirely proxied vintage cube in the mail last week! You proud of me, papa spice8rack?

My friends and I recently got back into magic after not playing for years. We've been playing commander with 100% proxied cards and it's great. You can make so many decks so quickly. Our deck building skills have been increasing rapidly, and we're playing decks with tons of fun, powerful cards.

The 30th anniversary drama really makes this all the more relevant

So happy you made this video, my friends not being a fan of being taxed for hundreds of dollars by a tcg were skeptical of commander and it wasn’t until we made a proxy deck for all of us that made them fall in love with the game. We play regularly now and proxy new decks when we see fit and while I’m stuck with a sickening disease of buying shiny cardboard they never have to spend a dime unless they want to! Being able to find the decks we all like to play and even having a whole proxy cube now I would suggest any one who is thinking about doing proxy’s to go for it!

yeah the best argument against proxying is that you're not spending money at your lgs, but even so it's not an especially strong argument. For instance, I tend to buy singles online because my lgs rarely has the cards I need (and also I build budget decks and my lgs isn't going to bother holding onto a bunch of

As a pretty obvious aside on the subject of proxies and card values, etc, I think the Pokemon TCG needs a lot of credit for having a really amazing model to balance playability and the resale market, and something that we've actually been harping on WotC for a while- they have multiple versions of valuable/powerful cards of varying rarities. For example, you can get a basic set of cards and build the deck that won last year's world championship for ~$30, meanwhile the rarest versions of some of those cards- foil, holo, first edition, alternate art, and limited release versions can sell to collectors for hundreds or even thousands of dollars a piece- everyone is happy; players get a low barrier to entry and still get to play the best cards and decks, collectors get rare and expensive cards to buy, sell, and trade among each other.

I know I'm going to enjoy this whole video because that SPICETHONY RACKTANO was just so bloody great.

Spice laughing at one of the greatest and scariest horror stories ever made really cracked me up. Uzumaki is really funny, i loved how everyone became an unified blob in the end, hysterical! What an amazing start to a wonderful work of spite.

Merry Christmas Spicy man

In my LGS we play gentry tournaments, so you are limited to 4 unique rares/mythics and 15 uncommons. This creates very budget friendly decks not built around the super good rares from sets thus not needing proxies. (They also give prizes to top 3 but then raffle out the rest)

As always, a perfect argument with sound reasoning and delivery, as well as some odd jokes here and there. I absolutely love it, have a good holiday season you spicy wonderboy.

Engagement

YEEE IM ENGAGING FOR THE ALGORITHM

I started playing MTG right after 4th edition came out. We used the extra basic lands to create proxies all the time. Missed the nice artwork but the game was still fun and allowed us to build the decks we wanted without having to spend money I didn't have at the time.

As a guy who makes custom commanders just about every week, I regularly have to proxy those and they're always a part of The Rule Zero Discussion, on top of that I have a local proxy guy who prints them for our game store's players and makes them all nice and foil-y and I'm more than happy to support that.

I feel so identified with spice having a discussion stucked in his head for so long that he decided to make a response video, lov u so much man

YOU MEAN I CAN PLAY A COMMANDER DECK WITH THE CARDS I WANT AND NOT SPEND MY RENT? WOW

I love sheepwave's art so much and I'm so glad you had her on this video : )

i posted this in my playgroups FB-group i think we needed it. thank you and happy holidays dear mr. spice

Spice is giving away the Yawgmoth version of himself but he's keeping the secret Spicey Slobad.

You are so entertaining Spice8Rack. TY so much for doing what you do and putting your style and effort into all the videos I've seen!

25:28 this hits different after the Pinkerton situation.

30 seconds in and he said Twitter and I had a “dear god”

Ngl, as someone who saved a whole months spending money for a Volcanic Island, I'm find with proxy-ing. I think it's honestly ridiculous to feasibly think that everyone can afford reserve list cards that in all fairness, aren't always that game changing in commander.

I work at my LGS, we have a house rule for proxies: Are you playing a store sanctioned event? Depends on the card. True duels and insanely rare cards that no one can afford and we don't have? We'd rather you don't, but we won't stop you. Things we have? Not allowed. Are you playing with your friends just at the store? We give zero shits

Didn't expect a spicy vid this close to Christmas thank you so much ( : I'm trying to get my group into cedh via proxies and having a spicy take helps. Also i love that you include timestamps I've never seen another magic content creator do that.

Comments lead to Engagement going up so that gatekeeping goes down

Engaging for the algorithm Spiceboi. and also because I 100% agree on proxies and alts being allowed. I hope to make ones in the coming future even!

11:14 Welcome to 2022! Proxies now cost $1,000.

I'm so glad you have made this video Spice. My friend and I were poor teenagers that liked the raw power of Vintage and would construct decks by assigning different suits of poker cards a magic card name (we each needed about four full poker decks apiece). Proxies shouldn't be a dirty word in Magic: The Gathering. Without them a vanishingly small number of fans will ever have the ability to play with those ancient cards and experience the rush of having the most broken combos at their fingertips.

Thank you for another fantastic video Mr spice. We recently had a discussion about this in my playgroup so this is very useful

THE EDIT ON TOP OF THE EDIT, we have reached peak meta.

Personally, I'm generally not a fan of proxying (though that's not to say I've never done it). But "personally" is the key word. I would never tell someone I'm sitting across the table from that they have to abide by my principles. People who do that are no different than vegans who insist that everyone eating with them must also eat vegan. My principles are for me.

This channel deserves more attention. You're hilarious and informative my friend. Thank you for the content

Turning their mockery of proxies into a whole video incentivising good practices, great art and also incentivising charity donations. Sweetie, you deserve better.

It's also nice to have proxies that can represent art that's more personal for me.

That feeling you mentioned at 39:25 about artwork, I didn't realize it until I drew my own token cards for the Mystery Booster playtest cards like Time Sidewalk and Gunk Slug. It reminded me of childhood, again. Such a great, warm feeling from such a simple action.

Shiiittttt… I use proxies for almost every Alpha/Beta card I own! I’m not even letting my wife break out the actual cards. Everyone we play with is well aware that I do indeed own the cards that I’ve proxied and they completely understand why I’m not tossing around $30,000.00 on my kitchen table. Plus, if you’ve ever tried to play with cards that you’ve had graded, you know that it’s not conducive to a smooth game of MtG. I was fortunate enough to have started playing literally right as Alpha shipped and that my parents are diligent organized people. I stopped playing when I left for college in 1998 and completely forgot about my collection until 2015 when my parents were moving to their retirement property. I had no idea what the cards were worth because I had been out of the community for sooo long, but a friend of mine was having a breakdown over what he was seeing and filled me in. Long story short, I don’t play any “official” tournaments anymore and I’m not trying to be ultra competitive. I just want to have fun playing MtG and relish in the nostalgia of feeling like the 15 year old who got his first summer job at a comic/card shop back in 1993. I think everyone should be able to enjoy any card that they want without having to fork over $10,000 minimum for an Alpha Louts or multiple $1,000’s a piece for Alpha Duals (yes, I am aware that Beta and Unlimited are “cheaper”, but they’re still in the same neighborhood as far as I’m concerned). I promise that if I hadn’t compiled my collection and forgotten about it, there’s no way I’d spend anything close to what the market wants for any card, regardless of its power level. I swear, I remember getting yelled at by my mom for a month plus because I bought a 2nd Lotus for $155.00, but she doesn’t want to hear about how it was actually a good investment. Looking back through, I can’t believe I was happy to spend that on a single card and I wouldn’t do it today. I’m all for proxies and that’s a blanket statement, I don’t care if you own a physical copy of the card in question or not, it’s a game and traditionally games are intended to be fun and enjoyable (at least I think so). I don’t see any issue with proxies being used outside of tournaments as long as they aren’t being used to con people out of their money. Sorry for the long ass comment, I got lost in the weeds a bit there.

Two years ago I was strongly against proxies. A few months ago, I bought my first proxy. The ballooning price of the game pushed me to reconsider my stance, and now I encourage my friends who are new to the game to proxy to see if they like it

Capitalists will see you supporting independent artists and still be like "how's that theft of intellectual property feel?"

I do believe that using well made proxies can create an MTG deck that is aesthetically uniform and I definitely want to do that at some point. Like making an izzet storm deck that has lightning effects on every card or has a particular art style. Would be absolutely sick!

Referendum to "The Card Police," in 2023. The Pinkertons

Boy this video really makes me want to engage with the creator and watch more videos on RU-vid. It would be a good idea to make this video show up in more searches, and to reward the creator monetarily.

Love it. I've been advocating for proxies for years. My advice: use color proxies in sleeves so it feels and looks enough like the real thing, but still obviously a proxy. Only proxy within you power level and budget, that cuts down on feel bads. Rule 0 should be your guiding rule, use it!

A couple more great examples of needing proxies: - Nigh-infinite cards such as Scute Swarm, which can create hundreds of copies of itself in a single turn if you build around it - Garth One-Eye, who can _MAKE A BLACK LOTUS_ - Using dice as +1/+1 tokens (or any others)

I love how many interesting people you include in your different videos. Oh and great video and very amusing as always :-)

Whoever did the animation for the cards deserve a clap on the back. They where so well done!

At MF Bologna, there were multiple judges in the command zone that said they don‘t care if you play Proxies as long as they were recognizable as proxies and the table was fine with it, despite us playing in the official command zone. It is funny how people on the internet get worked up about something that wizards and organizers are essentially fine with.

This is just beautiful start to finish. Thanks for being such a d, D, and thank @spice8rack for great content.

"Oh Mr. Proxy, you card" is genuinely the greatest, most seamless pun I've ever heard. That's not hyperbole, I really don't think you could do a pun better than that.

Been marathoning all your videos waiting for this one. Your content is amazing, keep the good work and be safe out there ❤

23:45 I think the thing with LGS has nothing to do with proxying cards you were never going to buy. Rather it's an issue about how the LGS is providing a service by giving you a space to game on the assumption that you will buy something. If you never have any intention of doing so you're kinda breaking that agreement. At worst though that's loitering and using up resources you never promised to help them make up, it's not stealing. If an LGS asks you to use real cards or leave though you should. Their store, their rules.

My thing with proxies will always be that I just don't want it to be the card name written on a basic land. I need to be able to easily read the card because I have trouble remembering what every card does at a moment's notice, and I shouldn't have to stop the game to look the card up. This was a great video and I agree with everything else :)

watching this on my birthday and THIS VIDEO IS ARGUABLY THE BEST GIFT I HAVE GOTTEN THIS YEAR.

I really appreciate you taking the time to caption this video, it's made it a lot easier for me (and I'm sure many others) to access. Also, missed opportunity to put "A Spite Video. By Spite8rack aged 24" in the intro. :P

I remember playing in Saviors of Kamigawa draft on release day, the judge made some proxies as they ran out of a certain number of basics I needed so they made proxies of the cards I needed. The head Judge can issue proxies which are legal in sanctioned events.

I have 2 different play groups and both of them have moved towards proxies. It made the power level among decks much more even and consistent since everyone had the expensive cards they normally couldn’t afford but should run in decks.

A delightful video right before Christmas,, thanks Spice! I'm already excited for the next season of the Spice8Rack Bizarre Adventure.

Most people: Don't feed the trolls Spice: This video + Charity

I have perused Meghan's artwork and it is absolutely amazing! I'm glad you had her in this video!

Late side note on your break-away comment: While you are allowed proxies in hidden zones, they aren't allowed in public zones. 713.5. If the substitute card is face up in a public zone, it should be set aside and the double-faced card or meld card that it represents should be used instead. This is probably the rationale for why an official copy is required in sanctioned tournaments. And yes, I realize a rule as a reason for the rule is circular.

I had no idea that this was a thing, but what a cool way to get creative with Magic! That's so fun. Definitely checking out these featured artists.

Ah yes, my favourite MtG content creator: Spite8Rack.

I freakin love you dude, like your videos are freaking long, but you're pretty cool so they're fun to watch XD

Thanks for this video, it's nice to bring more awareness into the fact that what matters when playing MTG is, in fact, having fun :D Btw, i LOVE your nails! they look amazing :o

"What are they going to do, call the card police?" ... no, just the Pinkertons

You had me at dabbing while playing Bloody Stream.