“Introduction”

The question of using proxies in your common commander deck is a question that many players will make when they begin playing Magic. This often can lead to a player deciding on one of the three options they have: purchasing the actual expensive card such as a Wrenn and six or Mana vault, Creating their own MTG proxy with land with some sharpie writing, or buying a real proxy from mtgproxy.com. To find the true value of MTG proxies we must take an in-depth look at the options listed and why they are completely inferior to real MTG proxies.

Creating a Deck

When looking for a commander deck (or any other deck such as modern or legacy) you have all of your power levels and then comes cEDH which is an entirely different game. These powerful decks are commonly worth over 1,000$ and contain extremely fragile cards that may be old and extremely hard to find.

Not only this but these cards’ prices can be through the roof if we look at something like a doubling season we see that the market price is over 100$ just for a card with a very small effect. 

Compare these to things like the best artifacts such as Mana Crypt and Jeweled Lotus and the numbers clearly show that beloved pieces of cardboard are not affordable for everyone. Now everyone loves playing a new person with their friends as much as the next person but upgrading those decks to anywhere near a level 7+ is an absolute investment. 

I personally have my beloved Shorikai, Genesis engine deck and to even be anywhere near competitive with something like a Krenko deck cost me over 200$ in upgrades just for lands, combo pieces, and spells. Looking at this we can clearly see that even though we may love our true cards as the next person, paying over 100$ for a card may feel necessary but most people’s wallets do not agree.

Secondly, when making a deck we can see that certain cards are very necessary. Such as a Blightsteel Colossus going into a Satoru Umezawa deck, these two are an amazing combo but Blighsteel comes in at a heft price.

Making your own MTG proxies is a way to do this but very often looks unprofessional and when playing with locals at your card store can look very embarrassing on your own. This can spiral even further if you forget what a card does your land card says the name and you have to look up what it does for the whole table to see. 

To put the cherry on top when you have to call a judge over they will have to look up the card and make sure the interaction can take place. With all of this confusion and embarrassment, it also comes with the hefty price that these cards are not tournament legal. So when it comes to it land MTG proxies are cheap but often come with harsh repercussions that may keep you up at night.

Onto the greatest of the three, MTG proxies (no not the lands I was speaking of) by MtgProxy.com is the perfect way to find the in-between in this situation. Proxies were a conflicting topic for many before but if we look at what wizards of the cost have just revealed last week we can see that paying 1000$ for some proxies is definitely not the choice there. 

MTG Proxies allow for very creative ideas and spin on cards and very often with your pod they are allowed and encouraged. My favorite proxies are people changing certain artifact vehicle cards into the Gundam characters and people can find and create their own perfect card. The opportunity is endless as long as your picture is small enough to create your own MTG masterpiece.

I personally know that I will be making my own textless versions of cards or cards relating to some of my favorite hobbies such as vehicles being created into cars like an Acura Integra. 

Not only is your creativity seen and used, but the price options for these cards are also much better than you could ever get a real card for on an auction site. For the low price of 2$ a card you get to create your own personal creation unique to you that you can use for whatever purpose is needed.All in all, we can clearly see that making your own unique MTG proxy is the route to choose and that there is truly no need to pay for your boring mana crypt to just play with friends.