Foil Japanese, Russian or Korean?

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Moderators: cataclysm80, hammr7, l0qii, Apocalypse2K, berkumps, dragsamou, mystical_tutor, pp

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In which language would you invest?

Japanese
1
6%
Korean
5
31%
Russian
10
63%
 
Total votes: 16

Alphafoil
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Foil Japanese, Russian or Korean?

Post by Alphafoil » Tue Dec 23, 2014 11:25 pm

As Wizards will keep promoting Modern, I'm thinking about investing in some Modern pimp stuff (only very good cards, which will probably be played for many years, like fetchlands).

Which language do you think is a better investment?

1. Japanese. It's traditionally the "pimpest" language for foils. Every card in Modern has a Japanese foil version, and while they are rare, they are much less rare than Russian and Korean, so you can have all your deck in the same language, which is important for many pimp players.

2. Russian. It's the most expensive language, because it's very rare and pimp players want it (in part because it's assumed that it's very rare). Except for 8th Edition, Mirrodin block and Kamigawa block, every modern card exists in foil Russian. But they are so rare, that in practice, even if you are willing to pay a lot, you won't be able to have a big percentage of your deck in foil Russian.

3. Korean. While it isn't clear, it seems to be as rare or even rarer than Russian. But for some reason it's cheaper (but more expensive than Japanese). Maybe it's because "pimp" players prefer Russian over Korean, and/or because they think Russian is rarer. You can't have a full foil Korean Modern deck, not only because of availability but also because Korean didn't come back until Innistrad. On the other side, it matches well with Japanese (at least, better than Russian), so some people may gravitate towards a combination of Korean and Japanese (when a Korean version doesn't exist or is very difficult to find).

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Post by Alien_Starfighter_Pilot » Wed Dec 24, 2014 12:22 am

I say Rainbow! 1 of each. I think it's awesome to say "now I play my Korean ____" and put it next to my Japanese/Russian ____.

cataclysm80
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Post by cataclysm80 » Wed Dec 24, 2014 3:58 am

I think Russian Foil is the way to go at the moment.
I'd suggest purchasing directly from Russian online card shops now that PayPal can convert to Rubles.
The falling value of the Ruble compared to other currencies should mean that you can get some good deals.
Pick up all the Russian Foil fetch lands you can get your hands on while they are still in print and plentiful. Heck, it might even be worth picking up some non-foil ones.
Hold on to them.
Buy even more of them when they rotate out of standard.
Wait at least a couple years before selling any.

Tav

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l0qii
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Post by l0qii » Wed Dec 24, 2014 5:25 am

Japanese is old and busted. Since Russian and Korean became available, Japanese has become much less pimp. To make things worse, Japanese is available in higher quantities to resellers domestically in the US in much larger quantities than Russian or Korean are, so there is more available.

All 3 languages are available in the US, from US resellers/distributors, but Russian and Korean are often limited to a single box, so you are forced to go directly to Korea or Russia/Ukraine for the cards you want. (I don't know what is available in Europe, can anyone offer insight?)

Lately, there have been a few sellers in Korea that are more than happy to make an endless supply of Korean boxes available on eBay, so that is why it is cheaper than Russian. There are a few reliable sellers in Russia/Ukraine, but it is harder to get than Korean. That said, I would be surprised if the print run of Russian was smaller than Korean. I think once a set goes out of print, Korean becomes harder to find than Russian does, which means the long term value of Korean should be higher than Russian even if it is cheaper during release.

Can anyone estimate the player population of these regions, maybe based of tournament turn out? That might shed some insight on print runs. Alternatively, can anyone offer explanation as to why WotC makes Japanese available in the US in large quantities, while the supply of Russian and Korean are artificially kept small?

Alphafoil
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Post by Alphafoil » Wed Dec 24, 2014 1:01 pm

cataclysm80 wrote:I think Russian Foil is the way to go at the moment.
I'd suggest purchasing directly from Russian online card shops now that PayPal can convert to Rubles.
The falling value of the Ruble compared to other currencies should mean that you can get some good deals.
Pick up all the Russian Foil fetch lands you can get your hands on while they are still in print and plentiful. Heck, it might even be worth picking up some non-foil ones.
Hold on to them.
Buy even more of them when they rotate out of standard.
Wait at least a couple years before selling any.

Tav
Why do you prefer Russian? Do you think it'll be the "pimpest" language also in the future? Why?

Alphafoil
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Post by Alphafoil » Wed Dec 24, 2014 1:21 pm

l0qii wrote:Japanese is old and busted. Since Russian and Korean became available, Japanese has become much less pimp. To make things worse, Japanese is available in higher quantities to resellers domestically in the US in much larger quantities than Russian or Korean are, so there is more available.

All 3 languages are available in the US, from US resellers/distributors, but Russian and Korean are often limited to a single box, so you are forced to go directly to Korea or Russia/Ukraine for the cards you want. (I don't know what is available in Europe, can anyone offer insight?)

Lately, there have been a few sellers in Korea that are more than happy to make an endless supply of Korean boxes available on eBay, so that is why it is cheaper than Russian. There are a few reliable sellers in Russia/Ukraine, but it is harder to get than Korean. That said, I would be surprised if the print run of Russian was smaller than Korean. I think once a set goes out of print, Korean becomes harder to find than Russian does, which means the long term value of Korean should be higher than Russian even if it is cheaper during release.

Can anyone estimate the player population of these regions, maybe based of tournament turn out? That might shed some insight on print runs. Alternatively, can anyone offer explanation as to why WotC makes Japanese available in the US in large quantities, while the supply of Russian and Korean are artificially kept small?
Japanese supply is indeed quite high compared to Russian and Korean. Not only because of what you say about being able to buy Japanese booster boxes outside of Japan, but also because there are many Japanese players, and Japanese players have the highest expenditure per capita in Magic in the world (I'm sorry, but I don't remember where I read that, maybe in "So do you wear a cape?"). So in total, there's a lot of supply.

In the case of Russian, not only there are less players, but they probably don't open as many boosters per capita as Japanese ones. In part because the GDP per capita is also lower (which is relevant unless Russian Magic players have in average a much higher GDP per capita than the rest of the country).

I have found a way to compare the supply of Korean versus Russian cards.
Look for complete listings on Ebay of "Khans foil Russian": http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=mt ... n&_sacat=0 (239 results)

And then, "Khans foil Korean": http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=kh ... n&_sacat=0 (131 results)

If you look for "Khans foil Japanese", you get 352 results (which is comparatively surprinsingly low): http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=kh ... e&_sacat=0

It isn't perfect, both because of variance and because maybe a bigger percentage of Korean cards than Russian ones are sold outside of Ebay. But without any more information, I think it may be useful data.

It seems like Korean is rarer. And from what I have read (I have never been there), it's hard to find Korean cards even in South Korea.

Considering that Russian is either as rare or less rare than Korean, and that Korean matches better with Japanese, I think we can discard Russian. And then my doubts are mainly between Japanese and Korean.

Korean is much rarer than Japanese, but it has one problem: You can't have all your Modern deck in foil Korean, both because it wasn't printed until Innistrad and because it's so rare that it can take a lot of time to complete your deck, even if you are willing to pay any amount of money for your cards. The other advantage of Japanese is that it's been traditionally considered as the "pimpest" language, so players may still prefer it, even if Korean is much rarer. And then, some may just find it more beautiful than Korean (but, in contrast, Korean old cards are noticeably more expensive than Japanese ones).

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Ertai's Familiar
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Post by Ertai's Familiar » Thu Dec 25, 2014 2:02 pm

I'm biased but I still voted.

Russian is way over hyped like Japanese from 02-10. The Russian market will open up in time once people realize how much they can gouge buyers.
squt: Sweet! That's the best trade - one that doesn't cost a thing.

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Alphafoil
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Post by Alphafoil » Wed Feb 25, 2015 10:22 pm

I'm surprised nobody voted Japanese, while prices are noticeable higher than for the rest of languages (except Korean and Russian, obviously).

There's still people that prefer it, for tradition, because they like it more, or because they don't even consider Korean and Russian, as it's too hard to find.

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Post by GlobalBoosterHunter » Thu Feb 26, 2015 7:02 am

I can usually manage to get hold of boosters of all of the above, but getting hold of Traditional Chinese is really causing headaches, probably not sending my friend to the right shops in Taiwan.

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mmgun
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Post by mmgun » Thu Feb 26, 2015 5:55 pm

Russian cards have the most value in modern. But if you want to seriously play modern, take japanese, because it has at least all the cards !

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