Leon Richter-Freund stores his collection of about 100 paper cards in a box, each card protected in an individual plastic sleeve.
“This is $1,500, that pile right there,” he said at a meeting of the Cool Collectable Card Gamers club.
Richter-Freund said the cards are from a popular trading card game, “Magic: The Gathering,” commonly referred to as Magic.
The game, which began in 1993, is a complex strategy game made up of spells, creatures and the resources needed to power them, all printed on collectable cards, Richter-Freund said.
“Some people spend money putting rims on their cars; I spend money on Magic cards because that’s what brings me joy,” he said. “I used to work a kind of crappy job, and after every paycheck I would buy new cards for my deck. It was a little bit of motivation.”
Michael Dunagan, the club’s president, said that while he founded the club for enthusiasts of all collectible card games, at the group’s Friday night meetings gamers rarely play anything but Magic.
“I really thought that there would be more diversity in the card games,” he said.
Dunagan said he has grown more competitive since he first began collecting Magic cards in earnest.
“I still collect some of the pricey cards because you can use so may of them that you wouldn’t be able to in standard (variations),” he said.
One of those pricey cards is called a “foil.” “Foils” are distinguished by their shiny finish, Dunagan said.
“There’s a guy in town, his nickname is ‘Foil Dave’ because he collects nothing but foil cards,” he said. “He has probably the largest collection of foils in the state of New Mexico. His collection is probably worth tens of thousands of dollars, or just over $10,000 at the least.”
He said online card catalogs list precise values of cards and ensure fair trading, as well as fair purchases from various vendors. Some collectors focus solely on collecting particular sets to resell. Instead of selling his cards for a profit, however, Dunagan said he collects his cards to play the game and build his own decks.
“I’m not going into it like a game of investment,” he said.
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Outside of the time and money put into collecting a deck of cards, Richter-Freund said there’s a strong sense of community with the card collectors, who readily share their most valuable cards with fellow gamers.
“As a collector, I’m protective to a point,” he said. “But as much as I might have spent, at the end of the day they’re pieces of paper and there are more important things in life.”
3C Gamers Club
Fridays
5:30 p.m.
SUB Fiesta room
