Mother of Monsters

So, aside from the funny little thing about me hawksitting/incubating my Jaces, I would like to bring up a particular theft that occurred at the Tabletop Room at Anime Expo to the community.

Now that I think about it, I’m not sure if my friend was talking about the same victim, since card thieves are a rather common atrocity at major tournaments and conventions; some of you might remember the incident at one of the more recent Grand Prixs where a guy had his entire foil Cube stolen, and his group’s car broken into.

As for the guy I ran into though, who I believe Chandra (chibisakuraninja) and I also played a game or two with (the convention as a whole is kind of a blur), he brought essentially his entire collection with him to the con - and you already know what happened afterward. The worst part is that he knows what the thieves looked like (I could say that it was two guys, both kind of had beards and one of them had something akin to a cowboy hat, but that sounds like a LOT of people at the convention considering the amount of TF2 cosplayers, it sounded like one of them might have been a Sniper cosplayer? I’m not clear on the details), as they had passed him multiple times and were eyeing his bag; as soon as he took his eyes off of it, just for a minute or two, it was gone. The guy eventually found his bag but it was emptied of all of his cards/valuables.

As for this particular case, I would basically like to raise a red flag to the SoCal MtG community game shops - reblogging and spreading the word would be very helpful - as well as any MtG Ebay frequents to keep an eye out for anyone who might be selling off a suspicious amount of valuable cards. Also, if anyone knows the name of this victim - or any recent theft victims from Anime Expo - it would be greatly helpful in case we do find any leads.

Aside from that, I can’t really think of what else to do other than give some advice as to how to keep your cards safe. Some of you might call this guy out as being dumb for bringing his collection with him, but that’s what we do at conventions and tournaments - we bring stuff for trading, selling, and for games. I’ve done the same for every single convention and Grand Prix I’ve ever gone to and I’ve yet to have a single card or property go missing despite the sheer and obvious amount of weight I carry with me.

So yeah, most of you probably know these things, but as a safety reminder to everyone who carries cards, trade binders, figurines, laptops, or any other major valuables with them to conventions, tournaments, and gatherings:

1. Your bag does not leave your body. Ever. Even if you’re putting it down to grab your wallet to buy something or if you’re putting it under a table for gameplay, that bag had better be damn well against your leg or something - what I like to do is either hawk-sit it (keep it between my legs) or put my foot through one of the shoulderstraps. Yeah, it looks kind of dumb and like I’m incubating my Jaces or something but seriously, this one basic thing will usually save you a lot of trouble. It’s saved me years of it, after the first time I got my cards stolen (I made sure it was the last time).

2. Leave nothing of value in your car, or anywhere, at all. Laptops, tablets, collections - yes, it’s going to get heavy, but a little bit of exercise and maybe back pain is still more bearable than having your car broken into and your stuff stolen. This is what happened in particular to the playgroup of that one guy from Grand Prix who got his Cube stolen - thieves don’t just grab things unexpectedly; they watch you, stalk you, and wait for you to take your eyes off of something or leave your car. Don’t give them the satisfaction. Goes hand-in-hand with “your bag doesn’t leave your body”.

3. If you absolutely MUST leave your bag with someone, leave it with someone you absolutely know and trust that isn’t busy. Sorry, people you just met and had a nice chat with at the con don’t count; if I remember correctly there was also another person who had their cards stolen when they left their bag with someone they’d just played a game with or something - or maybe it was the same guy (again, blur). I would also like to emphasize the “not busy” part - leave it with a friend who’s taking a break and sitting down and isn’t likely to leave that spot for a while - friends will forget too, or will need to go to the bathroom or may be just as tired as you. Make their job easier for them.

3b. Even better, leave it with a Bag Check service. Those people get paid to do their job well, and at least if anything goes missing while in Bag Check, you know who’s responsible or you know who you can hold responsible.

4. When trading with others, if you’ve got a trade binder, you’re either watching the hell out of the guy you gave your binder to look at, or you’re holding their binder (the latter gives you an equal amount of influence/power over them). Also, you two can list out to each other which cards you’re interested in, but absolutely NOTHING leaves the sleeve or page until you have both agreed on a deal.

I’ll try to come up with some more as I think of them but yeah, these things are pretty basic but people tend to forget them at the moments when they least want to! Just remember to be a good mama/papa hawk AND SIT ON THOSE EGGS. OR SOMETHING.

CAW CAW CAWBLADE MOTHERFUCKER