Comments on: Insider: Understanding the Mind of a Casual Trader

By: Jared Elick

Jared Elick — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 23:06:50 +0000

In reply to mirageOfHope. Man, no one has touched my 3 Fire-alarm fires. I envy you. Utvara Hellkites, though, those do fly out of the binder quick.

By: Jared Elick

Jared Elick — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 23:05:46 +0000

In reply to Mathieu Malecot. I usually put good cards next to bulk/$1 cards that have good/interesting synergy. I get rid of an extra buck or two in a trade, and I'm happy. 4 trades an hour, extra $8? seems good.

By: Jared Elick

Jared Elick — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 22:16:27 +0000

In reply to David Schumann. Even giving away a random bulk rare that you value at $.10-$.15 can make you a casual friend for life. They will often find a pile of stuff they want that you have no use for, and have something you'd prefer.

By: David Schumann

David Schumann — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 18:28:03 +0000

In reply to Nikolas Mohammed. Yep, this is pretty common place actually. As much as SCG and others want people to think it's the competitive players that make magic thrive..it's the casual guys..these are the ones who open packs and trade away the rare lands for cool flavorful cards and are thrilled to get 5-7 cards for a high dollar competitive card. It's very important to be honest with these guys and I too always give away my draft leavings to the newer guys...nothing makes a new friends like free stuff (especially when you have no use for it anyways).

By: mirageOfHope

mirageOfHope — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 16:31:34 +0000

Nice article! I don’t know if this is a fluke, but I had a pretty huge trade start out with a casual who was looking for some Five-Alarm Fires, so maybe there is some casual appeal there. Also, Utvara Hellkite doesn’t last long in my binders and its mythic rarity causes people who want it to overvalue it, but competitive players see it as crap and I can get them as throw-ins.

By: Mathieu Malecot

Mathieu Malecot — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 15:45:35 +0000

i put playables and casual targets together. helps identify who’s in your binder and putting something janky next to something good often helps move the jank out.

By: Nikolas Mohammed

Nikolas Mohammed — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 14:58:52 +0000

Good insights. At least 5% of the players at my stores are casual. Funny how three of the cards you mentioned in your article I heard mentioned by a newer casual player at the LGS I play at. He was itching to get the needed Stuffy Dolls for his deck. And when he discovered I opened a Hellkite Tyrant in a Gatecrash draft, he immediately offered to trade for it. I saw him make a trade in which he handed a player $20 worth of cards for $5 worth of crap rares. When he looked through my binder full of type II playables there really wasn’t too much that excited him that he could afford. He mentioned he was looking for Vraska and was going to trade away a Gatecrash shock land to someone in the store who had one. I felt bad that he was bleeding the value of his collection away so told him he probably wanted to get two Vraskas for it. Of course I had to give away my draft garbage to this guy because few appreciate it more than this type of player. I had almost forgotten casual players exist until I met this guy.