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Shark Evolution: The Rarity Shark

Bring cash.  Magic players are poor.  They are always in need of money.  Take advantage of this knowledge.  Everyone needs to eat, but sharks feast.

Time is money.  Never buy at cost. 

Act like you don’t know what is going on.  I have the best innocent act where I pretend I’m a new player who doesn’t know what is going on.  This works at bigger events. 

Try to mimic stores.  Stores give 50% of what a card is worth.  You should target 60-70% as your margins. 

A lot of magic players are lazy.  Take advantage of this.  Become the store.  You don’t need the actual cards.  All you need to do is to let people know that you can get the cards they need.  But if you get the cards then they must take them. 

Make it your duty to find cards in the store. 

Money is the most important asset in magic.  There is nothing like it.  Never overpay for a card. 

Sharks travel in groups.  Make sure you have a great white in your party.  This will make getting any card easy.  You will be able to represent a huge collection and collect on the margins. 

Shark Evolution: The Most Vicious Shark

Remember you have to maximize profit.  Greed is your friend. 

Take a look at the room.  Seek out weaker players.  Go around and collect the absolute values.  The absolutes are people who know what they want.  Try to find those people who are ready to trade.  These are the best type of buyers/traders.

If a person doesn’t come close to your value, then don’t talk to them.  If it is a good card there is no reason to give a deal.  No pity.  If everyone wants the card, why do you have to give someone a deal?  It doesn’t make sense. 

If a person says that they are not looking for something, do not trade with that person.  It is likely you will get a good deal. 

Also if a person is showing off your collection to their friends, its time to get out of there.  Time is money.  I had this happen all the time.  You are not a museum you are a shark.  Act like one. 

Show people your binder only if you see something in their binder that you want.  Establish pricing for the item before you give them your binder.  This is a nasty trick because you can always change the value of your cards.  Your trade partner psychologically gives you more respect when you are pricing your own cards.

Remember you are a shark, you are ethically challenged. 

Shark Evolution: Knowing your Environment

I will train you how to become a true shark.  A nasty shark. 

You should know the store you go to.  If the store you go to is casual bring EDH.  If it is more tailored to Legacy, then bring legacy staples.  If modern is a hit then bring modern.  Always bring standard hot cards to trade into modern or legacy. 

Also recognize that foils have their own audience.  It is like a puzzle.  You have to find out what cards you need to bring to what place.  The best sharks can smell weakness. 

You want to make the maximum use of your time when you trade.  When you have as many cards as I do and trade as frequently you have to organized and know who your audience is. 

Some traders like the rarest cards and have the assets to trade for them.  I don’t even offer my rare or collection binder to someone who I haven’t traded with before.  

I always approach with my crappy binder first in hopes that they pick something from that binder.  Make sure to put in some gems, i.e. standard gems in your crappy binder to make it seem like it is a real binder.

Do not give your higher binder to someone who doesn’t have the assets to trade with you.  You don’t want to waste your time. 

I only bring my collection binder to GPs.  It includes all my alters and true legacy staples.  It would be a waste to bring it to DNA comics since there isn’t big enough buyers or traders there. 

Shark Evolution: Creating Hype and Restricting Supply

I will train you how to become a true shark.  A nasty shark. 

For some reason having a lot of a card makes people want to devalue the card.

I never carry more than a playset in my binder.  I make it appear that I only have a playset allowing me to put pressure on the person to trade for it now. 

If you knew how many I actually had, you would think my cards were less expensive and attempt to lowball me.  Its only human nature. 

Presentation is very important.  I store my extras for large events in an extras box. I take out my extras when I run low.

If I filled up my binder with all my repeat cards, it would decrease the value because there are so many.  People will attempt to lowball me just because they know I have more.  The rationale is that I must have gotten my cards for cheap since I have so many. 

It also takes time.  I want to trade with as many people as possible.  Not have one person admire my 50 lol trolls or 40 shamans.  The more time it takes for someone to go through the binder the less time you have to trade with other people.

The  key is to have a playset of a card but no more in your binder.  This will create the impression that you are the player to go to, but the person should get the playset now before it is too late. 

Sharks are Everywhere

Everyone is a shark.  The only question is how much of a shark are you?  Are you a baby shark or a great white shark?  

Even the most casual places for magic are infested with sharks.  I’ve been on record saying I found the best place to play magic in Houston.  A place where everyone is nice and there are no sharks.  This is not true.  Idealized this place and only recently has it become very clear that there are a lot of sharks.  I no longer even bring my medium binder to trade since very few people can trade on my level and the people who can are sharks.  

I can classify sharks in two different groups, the shark that comes once in a blue moon only to trade.  This shark normally comes during pre-releases or game days.  This happened in DNA some time ago.  A shark came in and traded a few foil commons and full art zendikar lands for an underground sea and a bonfire of the damn.  I am completely serious.  The shark then hightailed it out there since they weren’t playing at the event.  The person they sharked… the tournament organizer….  

The other group of sharks are locals.  They support each other and use social pressure to hurry up a trade.  Because they have been playing magic so long they have a certain clout that makes them difficult to challenge.  This is the far more dangerous shark because on the surface they may not seem to be a shark.

I would much rather deal with the shark I know then the shark I don’t. 

Sharking Casual Players for Profit

One of the most important things to know as a shark is how to spot an easy target.  I will refer to targets as tuna.  Tuna that swim in schools are difficult to target because someone will check their phone or alert the tuna trader that they are being ripped.  But tuna that swim alone, are just asking to be sharked.  

Casual players are much better targets because not only do they have little knowledge about what their cards are worth, they have little knowledge about what your cards are worth.  Understanding that every trade is two sides is essential.  

There are two values in every trade.  The value for your cards and the value for their cards.  If your cards are valued higher that is one way to shark someone.  But valuing someone else’s cards lower is also another way.  Casual players are much more likely to do both the above.  

And when I mean casual, I mean kitchen table, edh, essentially the guy with a deck more than 61 cards.  

But are these tuna the best to eat?  Yes.  They have a ton of staples especially if another shark has not feasted on their binders previously.  Ever wonder who actually buys planechase… all those decks with two baleful strixs, two shardless agents… etc…  Ever wonder who buys a box with no idea what cards are good?  The answer, casual players. 

There is nothing more disheartening to a shark then seeing a casual player’s binder that has already been ripped to oblivion by another shark.  It is sad, but it is the cycle of life.  Sharks eat tunas and tunas get eaten by sharks.       

I am proud to be a shark

Sharking has been the red haired stepchild of the family when it comes to magic.  It has been rejected, ignored, and largely despised by hypocrites who themselves are sharks.  I am here to make the argument that sharking is essential to magic. 

First off, everyone has sharked at least once.  Whether you will admit it or not, that is not my issue.  My point is simple, why do so many people hate something everyone does and they themselves do? 

Honestly, if you have never sharked before you can skip this week’s worth of videos and I’ll make an alternative kitten videos just for you.  

The answer to the question is they don’t hate it.  They only hate when other people do it.  Let that sink in for a moment.  Sharking only exists if a certain percentage of the population does it.  If everyone is a shark then no one is a shark.  MOTL is a perfect example of this principle.

A few months back when I was still new to the tube, I made a kitten speculation about the greatest shark of all time, the person who made pack to power famous.  The video was sort of parody but actually a tribute to this person.  Said person then via twitter and other means reached out to me.  I took down the video on my own accord out of respect for someone who changed the magic scene forever.  What struck me as weird was that here we have the greatest shark of all time and he is embarrassed or at the very least not happy to be labeled a shark.  

Why?  Long time subscribers know that I despise sharks yet I have a tendency to be shark like in nature.  Add to this, a playgroup that includes an mtg ebay expert, a vendor, and a store owner, it is hard for me not to be a shark.  When I was doing speculation to power, it dawned on me that to finish the series I would need to shark.  This realization was met with honesty. 

In December I had less than 20 subs.  I made a video saying that I was a shark.  Content became better because it was more honest.  Now, what I am saying should be clear.  I am still a shark.  Not a nasty shark, but a shark nonetheless. 

This week of videos will be a reckoning of sorts as I finally explain to you what sharking actually is and most importantly how a shark thinks. 

Why am I doing this?  Because I’ve sharked recently and the only way I can make sure I don’t do it again is if everyone has fair warning that I am a shark.  On MOTL everyone knows I’m a shark therefore they are fair game.  I am proud to be a shark.    

speculating kitten

shark Cove New

How to Protect Yourself from Thieves

As magic becomes more valuable, players are starting to steal more and more.  I remember at Asgard being told that someone had their Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale stolen.  The card is 320 dollars on TCG mids.  And at DNA two traders came to the pre-release and were very shady.  Later people who they had traded with them found they were missing cards. 

Here are some tips.  

Consolidate your collection into one binder.  If you have more than one binder, only trade from one binder at a time.  You really shouldn’t bring more than two binders.  

Sleeve trick. Put a sleeve behind the more valuable cards.  That way when they pull the card they will pull an empty sleeve.  You can catch them red handed this way.  It is surprising to the thief. 

Never trade with more than one person at a time.   Make sure their friends are not passing cards around.  Plus you really need to focus on a trade and out of respect you should only be doing one trade at a time.   

Keep a look out for your belongings.  Cameras don’t always work.  

And remember once a shark always a shark/once a thief always a thief. If someone attempts to rip you off once or steal from you, they will try again.  May be not with you again, but with someone else.