Not Tournament Legal
General forum
Posted on Oct. 20, 2017, 10:18 p.m. by Geralf_Cecani
Recently I was browsing Card Kingdom looking for a perpetual card advantage engine for my Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder deck, when I remembered that Necropotence exists. So I check the price, and am ashamed to discover that the cheapest printing is, like $9999. I'm about to give up when I see that there IS a printing of Necropotence that's only $3. However, it has the dreaded words "Not Tournament Legal" written next to it. My question is, since I'm not going over to the competitive scene anytime soon, what is different about non-legal cards? How can you tell them apart? Because if the only difference is that they have a different coloured back, then I could simply whack it in a sleeve and save a bunch of money. My playgroup is pretty chill, so they probably won't mind, so long as there is no way that I could make sure i know which card is Necropotence. Could you tell a sleeved "Not Tournament Legal" card from a sleeved normal card from the back?
So two things. Only expensive printing of Necropotence are the OG ones. Try the EMA printing
October 20, 2017 10:34 p.m.
Second, you can only tell from the back of the card and or the set symbol
October 20, 2017 10:36 p.m.
Aswell you can tell by gold borders.
These cards are made as reprints of magic world championship winner decks and cannot be played in scg sanctioned tournaments.
Any use in casual play should be ok as long as your local playgroup doesnt have reasonable arguments against it
October 20, 2017 10:51 p.m.
I thought "$9999.?? no way. that's a 10 dollar card". I did't think $10 is an expensive card. I may need to reevaluate by MTG budget!
Also... Our group uses proxies so no big deal here.
October 20, 2017 10:59 p.m. Edited.
PhotogenicParasympathetic says... #7
Necropotence is not a 10000 dollar card. It's least common printing is 16 dollars. In general, it should be 5-10 dollars depending on the edition. Someone listing it for that much is absurd.
October 20, 2017 10:59 p.m.
PhotogenicParasympathetic It's 9.99 at Card Kingdom. He just added an extra 9 on accident
October 20, 2017 11:01 p.m.
Geralf_Cecani says... #9
SteelSentry, Entrei, Thorbogl, AMJacker, and PhotogenicParasympathetic, thanks for your help.
My playgroup is pretty chill, e.g. once a mate borrowed a shitload of my Islands so I played Kaho, Minamo Troll using Mountains lol. I also know that Necropotence is only 7 or so dollars, hell, there's even a printing going for 5 that's being shipped after Nov the 17th, but I try and make an effort not to spend more then $3-4 on a card. The $9999 was an exaggeration for the sake of humour lol.
Thanks for your help! In return, have a picture of a kitten 
October 20, 2017 11:30 p.m.
PhotogenicParasympathetic says... #10
Yeah, wow. Now I feel dumb. I was legit about to get furious if Necropotence was being listed that high. That makes way more sense.
October 21, 2017 2:13 a.m.
I dont mind spending 5-10 or even $50 on a card if I think itll retain its value. And I need it in a deck of course. Far too often Ill brew a deck spend $50-100 on all the cards then only play it a few times over before loosing interest in it.
Spending the big bucks on lands makes the most sense since obv.
October 21, 2017 11:09 p.m.
Online retailers often crank up the prices on cards to unreasonable amounts so they don't get sniped by competetors speculating on new sets, banned and restricted updates, and so on. They do this leading up to a set's release.
For one, no one with $10k to spend on Magic is going to spend it on a card like Necropotence. And two, it lets them show that they have the cards in stock, but they didn't have to take them offline/make them unavailable. That often means having employees write down the number they have in stock, remove them from the online store, then put them back online later and hope they didn't get the count wrong.
In other words, it's just easier to set cards to something some absurd price if a shop thinks the price that might change. Otherwise, a retailer like SCG might buyout their inventory of Necropotence for $10 each, then flip them a week later for $20 if they know something is going to happen (new set, buyout, bans, etc.).
This usually isn't an issue for local retailers because they don't have large quantities of cards stockpiled and they're selling to locals. In order to have the gamble pay off, you generally want to auction snipe large quantities, or else you're paying a lot in shipping and manpower to make $2~$10 (maybe even $25+) per card. Thus, online shops have to be more cautious with this sort of thing.
SteelSentry says... #2
I would make sure with your play group. The biggest thing would be to make sure your sleeves are opaque enough so that you can't see the back.
Also, Necropotence is only like $7
October 20, 2017 10:32 p.m.