Topic: Condition options suggestion

The current options for marking card conditions are:
Mint
Near-Mint
Good (Lightly Played)
Played
Heavily Played
Poor

I think this is wrong.  There's a big difference between "near-mint" and "lightly played."  A near-mint card is "so close to mint as to be nearly indistinguishable from it."  Basically, if you can actually tell (without a magnifying lens) that a card is not "mint," then it's not "near-mint" either.  That's what "so close as to be nearly indistinguishable" means.  Further, a truly "mint" card is so pristine that there's absolutely nothing wrong with it, under the highest scrutiny, even when you do put it under that lens.  Most of us have probably never even seen a truly "mint" card, and what we call "mint" is usually actually "near-mint."  For this reason, most other condition guides that I've seen lump these two together into one single "NM/M" category.

Now, the next step down from "so close to mint as to be nearly indistinguishable from it," at least here, is "light, but obvious play-wear." There's a whole spectrum of conditions that could fall into this category, from the tiniest nick on the edge of an otherwise-NM card, to unsleeved shuffle wear from a 6-round sealed deck event.  If someone says they have a card in "LP" condition, you don't know what you're gonna get.

The other day I traded a "LP" Sensei's Divining Top for a "LP" Mutavault.  I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, but I was pretty disappointed when the card I received was in far worse condition than the one I sent.  But there was no way for me to indicate that my card was "not quite mint, but really still in very nice condition" nor him to say that his was "not quite beat to hell, but getting there."

I guess I should just call my barely-dinged-up cards NM, that's what everyone else seems to do.  But it doesn't feel right to me, knowing that near mint is supposed to be damn-near actual mint condition.  But SP (or LP) is so much worse than not-quite-NM.  I guess in the end it all just boils down to a matter of semantics, but my suggestion is simply to rename the current conditions as such: "Mint" should be renamed "Near-Mint/Mint" (after all, these two are supposed to be nearly indistinguishable from each other, right?) and the current "Near Mint" should be renamed "Excellent" to cover the not-quite-mint, but mostly-undamaged and not-obviously-played cards in between "Near Mint" and "Lightly Played."  You wouldn't even really need to convert people's collections to the new system, as most people seem to be calling these "Near Mint" already, anyway.  Just rename them, and they can mean what they say.

Re: Condition options suggestion

I disagree with your proposed solution of changing the names of the conditions as it doesn't actually solve anything because they can be ambiguous. Everybody grades their cards differently. That is one of the bigger problems involved in trading card games." You can change the names of the conditions all you want, but people will keep grading their cards poorly (or not at all). The problem is that the conditions don't have extremely clear-cut definitions. I think Blackborder has a pretty good condition guide, but even that isn't good enough for 99% accuracy. There are an infinite number of possible imperfections a card could have and it just isn't reasonable to create a grading system that clearly defines all the grades and that everybody is expected to use for every single one of their cards.

If condition is an issue for you, ask. Pictures will be much more helpful than a simple grade.

When people ask me about card condition I either take pictures if the card(s) are worth the time or I add + and - to the current grading scale to add more definition.

Profile  Tradelist

Re: Condition options suggestion

I think it would be cool if it were possible to upload pictures of cards -- I'm interested in just how "damaged" some damaged cards are, for example. It might be cool if folks could choose to upload a photo that would be visible.

I agree with Kammikaze that we don't need to split hairs here. Grading is so subjective anyway that no matter how many grades we have or how clear the guidance is, there really isn't any substitution for photos, and I don't want trading on the site to be more cumbersome as we review card condition on every tiny card.

Re: Condition options suggestion

Kammikaze wrote:

I disagree with your proposed solution of changing the names of the conditions as it doesn't actually solve anything because they can be ambiguous.

It may not be a be-all, end-all solution, but I think it's at least a step in the right direction...

Re: Condition options suggestion

IronMagus wrote:
Kammikaze wrote:

I disagree with your proposed solution of changing the names of the conditions as it doesn't actually solve anything because they can be ambiguous.

It may not be a be-all, end-all solution, but I think it's at least a step in the right direction...

Look, I completely understand where you are coming from. I've had to deal with this plenty of times myself in my time in mtg. TCGPlayer and SCG, the two biggest mtg retailers in the US (and probably the world, idk) use the NM, LP, MP, HP, Damaged scale. I would say it's probably a good idea to use the same.

Profile  Tradelist

Re: Condition options suggestion

The most important thing for this standards to provide is consistency. We shouldn't make new categories or change their stringency if that means that, say, I can't buy a "near mint" card off of TCGPlayer and list it on here as "near mint" with reliability. Near Mint does allow some flaws and I can understand some people not liking that, but the flipside is that I like being able to reliably open a pack and just list the rares as NM without having to make sure that they have tiny flaws, as many cards can have straight out of the pack.

Re: Condition options suggestion

9700377 wrote:

We shouldn't make new categories or change their stringency if that means that, say, I can't buy a "near mint" card off of TCGPlayer and list it on here as "near mint" with reliability. Near Mint does allow some flaws and I can understand some people not liking that, but the flipside is that I like being able to reliably open a pack and just list the rares as NM without having to make sure that they have tiny flaws, as many cards can have straight out of the pack.

A good point.  So perhaps I should just change my perception of what "near mint" means/is supposed to mean, and just list cards that I would have called "excellent" (obviously not "mint," but not "obviously played" either) as NM instead.

Re: Condition options suggestion

My advice would be to ask the person you are trading with 'Do your cards have any noticeable edge dings or surface scratches?  I am extremely picky about card condition.' 

When asked, I've had dozens of people reply 'Yes, my NM so-and-so has a few dings but nothing bad' or 'Well, if you hold the foil under the light, the surface is somewhat cloudy but it still looks great.'   And then I would politely back out of the trade and pursue other options.

Re: Condition options suggestion

I would like to see Mint, Near Mint, Very Fine, Fine, Good, Played, Heavily Played, Poor (or something similar).

Profile - Wishlist - Tradelist

Black and Blue--not just for bruises anymore.

Re: Condition options suggestion

HikingStick wrote:

I would like to see Mint, Near Mint, Very Fine, Fine, Good, Played, Heavily Played, Poor (or something similar).

We do have something similar. The problem isn't the words used to describe the conditions, it's the definitions of the conditions.

Profile  Tradelist

Re: Condition options suggestion

Kammikaze wrote:
HikingStick wrote:

I would like to see Mint, Near Mint, Very Fine, Fine, Good, Played, Heavily Played, Poor (or something similar).

We do have something similar. The problem isn't the words used to describe the conditions, it's the definitions of the conditions.

Agreed. We need precise definitions. Photo examples (multiple for each grade) would be ideal, but may be hard to pull off (since there likely will be no perfect consensus).

Profile - Wishlist - Tradelist

Black and Blue--not just for bruises anymore.

Re: Condition options suggestion

Well, our conditions page was inspired from the pretty standard I think black border condition guide

http://deckbox.org/help/card_conditions
http://www.blackborder.com/cgi-bin/cust … dition.cgi

Our categories are the same as those basically. I do agree pictures would help a lot. I do not want to take theirs, as we are not allowed, but if anyone from the community would like to submit nice scans that correspond to these conditions, I will gladly put them up on our page, and give credit.

Re: Condition options suggestion

One thing that could help a lot would be a per-card "notes" field where you could describe the condition of your cards (in inventory, tradelist, and/or wishlist) in any way you see fit. Is something like this already in the works with the "tags/labels" you're working on?

Re: Condition options suggestion

sebi wrote:

Well, our conditions page was inspired from the pretty standard I think black border condition guide

http://deckbox.org/help/card_conditions
http://www.blackborder.com/cgi-bin/cust … dition.cgi

Our categories are the same as those basically. I do agree pictures would help a lot. I do not want to take theirs, as we are not allowed, but if anyone from the community would like to submit nice scans that correspond to these conditions, I will gladly put them up on our page, and give credit.

One of the things I feel these guides lack is that there is a pretty big gap between NM and LP. Like, their LP example has white border wear all around it, while their NM has none. What if there's only a single tiny white mark on a card? LP or NM? It's difficult to say.

Re: Condition options suggestion

9700377 wrote:

One of the things I feel these guides lack is that there is a pretty big gap between NM and LP. Like, their LP example has white border wear all around it, while their NM has none. What if there's only a single tiny white mark on a card? LP or NM? It's difficult to say.

That's where I would use the "EX" label, if such a one existed (although it looks like BlackBorder says that LP and EX are the same?!)

Re: Condition options suggestion

9700377 wrote:

One of the things I feel these guides lack is that there is a pretty big gap between NM and LP. Like, their LP example has white border wear all around it, while their NM has none. What if there's only a single tiny white mark on a card? LP or NM? It's difficult to say.

There isn't actually any gap. LP is anything less than NM, but better than MP. If a 1-100 scale were used it would look something like:
100 - Mint
95-99 NM
75-95 LP
50-75 MP
20-50 HP
1-20 Damaged

IronMagus wrote:

That's where I would use the "EX" label, if such a one existed (although it looks like BlackBorder says that LP and EX are the same?!)

Excellent and Lightly Played do describe the same condition. There are plenty of conditions that overlap like that. Fine, Good, Very Good and others all overlap somewhere.

Profile  Tradelist