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Daniel Madison posted this earlier today...






I'm not really sure what Ellusionist is thinking. This is deck #9 or 10 in the Madison series in a very short amount of time.


CBJ

As long as people keep buying them....

Outside of design is there any deference between them quality wise?

Norbie wrote:As long as people keep buying them....

Outside of design is there any deference between them quality wise?

Pretty sure they're all the same. I still remember the sales pitch of the first ones where Madison supposedly had tried over 50 different stocks and finishes until he found the best combo

MagikFingerz wrote:

Norbie wrote:As long as people keep buying them....

Outside of design is there any deference between them quality wise?

Pretty sure they're all the same. I still remember the sales pitch of the first ones where Madison supposedly had tried over 50 different stocks and finishes until he found the best combo

Apparently he really meant colors/backs and is going to print them all.

CBJ wrote: I'm not really sure what Ellusionist is thinking. This is deck #9 or 10 in the Madison series in a very short amount of time.


CBJ

MagicFingerz- I hate to admit it but you're right. Color changes are a fact of life now and bitching about every one of them (which I'm totally guilty of) is a waste of energy. But as some point isn't this speaking negatively towards E's brand? Like CBJ said- what the hell are they thinking? At what point do they say, "Hey, we used to have original and awesome decks. Hell- we arguably paved the way for the modern day playing card. Maybe 9 color changes is enough. Let's show people we still have an original idea or two." Whether or not people keep buying them I think they're actually hurting themselves with these releases. Roy G. Biv is rolling over in his grave.

You see...they're called "Hustlers" and it's like a "hustle" - getting people to buy them, so it's actually kind of self-referentially funny in a sorta way.....sorta...

hikeeba wrote:You see...they're called "Hustlers" and it's like a "hustle" - getting people to buy them, so it's actually kind of self-referentially funny in a sorta way.....sorta...

Darn right, couldn't have picked a better name.

hikeeba wrote:You see...they're called "Hustlers" and it's like a "hustle" - getting people to buy them, so it's actually kind of self-referentially funny in a sorta way.....sorta...

Sounds about right. First E and Madison was just playin', then after people started buying all the decks they considered themselves "dealers", and now they're just straight hustlers.

They really aren't hiding anything, are they?

MagikFingerz wrote: Sounds about right. First E and Madison was just playin', then after people started buying all the decks they considered themselves "dealers", and now they're just straight hustlers.

MagikFingerz wrote:

hikeeba wrote:You see...they're called "Hustlers" and it's like a "hustle" - getting people to buy them, so it's actually kind of self-referentially funny in a sorta way.....sorta...

Sounds about right. First E and Madison was just playin', then after people started buying all the decks they considered themselves "dealers", and now they're just straight hustlers.

They really aren't hiding anything, are they?

Too funny!

So I like the overall idea of this back design, it's very bold and a different take. However, those varying borders on the side would drive me absolutely batty. No matter how much Q1-ness you inject you are going to see differences and the fact that even this one used in the marketing has a very noticeable off-centeredness doesn't bode well, unfortunately. You can't claim it's a marking system because there is no way to control the amount of change from deck to deck. Some may end up with no "marking system" at all.

I stayed away from designs like this in the past specifically to avoid this kind of issue. I'm a little surprised DM and Ellusionist were ok with it.

Gosh they have ONE LOGO. ONE DAMN LOGO. And you can churn out 10+ decks with this ONE LOGO. Kudos to them milking the udders till its ready to drop off.

I wonder if they have ever heard of brand dilution ??

When I saw the title of this thread, it didn't immediately register in my head that "Madison Hustlers" was the name of the actual deck. I thought CBJ was simply referring to DM's business practices.

MagikFingerz wrote:

hikeeba wrote:You see...they're called "Hustlers" and it's like a "hustle" - getting people to buy them, so it's actually kind of self-referentially funny in a sorta way.....sorta...

Sounds about right. First E and Madison was just playin', then after people started buying all the decks they considered themselves "dealers", and now they're just straight hustlers.

They really aren't hiding anything, are they?

Hahaha. I love this!

MagikFingerz wrote:

hikeeba wrote:You see...they're called "Hustlers" and it's like a "hustle" - getting people to buy them, so it's actually kind of self-referentially funny in a sorta way.....sorta...

Sounds about right. First E and Madison was just playin', then after people started buying all the decks they considered themselves "dealers", and now they're just straight hustlers.

They really aren't hiding anything, are they?

Heh "dealers". They even gave Black Club members their first hit "free" (remember when they sent BC members a free deck)? So glad I decided to quite that particular "club"

Are you freaking kidding me???!??

another one... can you say OVERKILL






Jay

I don't know what to make of this picture. Does this mean there is the regular red edition and a "limited" gold edition? If this was a gift, does this mean E is sending Black Club members complimentary decks?

sinjin7 wrote:I don't know what to make of this picture. Does this mean there is the regular red edition and a "limited" gold edition? If this was a gift, does this mean E is sending Black Club members complimentary decks?

Seems a little racist to me...

What if I wanted one?

Why the white rail border on the long sides of the back? Why not a full bleed off all four sides?

Isn´t it obviously that they made this "orange" deck as a limited deck?
Would make perfect sense when you look back how E had handled the releases of the Madison Rounders. At every color change there was this Buy 12 decks and get a free Limited XYZ-Color deck of Madison Rounders for free.
I guess that sales tactics will conitnue with this new deck series " Hustlers"

Widdee wrote:Why the white rail border on the long sides of the back? Why not a full bleed off all four sides?

Probably because the design doesn't work well being full-bleed, it would be very easy to spot poor printing registration. And as Paul pointed out, even the deck in the promo pic is off-center.

I'll say it again........as long as the lemmings keep lining up with cash in hand, it won't stop.

vasta41 wrote:

CBJ wrote: I'm not really sure what Ellusionist is thinking. This is deck #9 or 10 in the Madison series in a very short amount of time.


CBJ

MagicFingerz- I hate to admit it but you're right. Color changes are a fact of life now and bitching about every one of them (which I'm totally guilty of) is a waste of energy. But as some point isn't this speaking negatively towards E's brand? Like CBJ said- what the hell are they thinking? At what point do they say, "Hey, we used to have original and awesome decks. Hell- we arguably paved the way for the modern day playing card. Maybe 9 color changes is enough. Let's show people we still have an original idea or two." Whether or not people keep buying them I think they're actually hurting themselves with these releases. Roy G. Biv is rolling over in his grave.

Well, I guess the mentality might be different now since pretty much the entire lineup of guys involved in the designing is different now compared to a few years ago. With the Arcane (white, black, gold), Artifice (first few decks) and Infinity and that era it was Lee (McKenzie) and Jason (Brumbalow) in charge of design and art direction. I also believe Jason had his say about the art direction for the first Sultans (though with this particular deck I might be misremembering the dates), and the Fathom deck, and Lee was designing most of it although I don't know if he stayed on or not for the completion of the Ignite deck.

My point is that when the lineup of the crew changes, the mentality changes. I'm sure there's still a strive for creating new designs within E but it's not the same guys, not the same mentality and not the same art direction now that it was before.

This deck is nice but nothing that will make me rush to get it. I might pick it up if I decide to grab something else. I hope E will try to keep breaking new ground like they (we) did in the past with the first black deck, the performance coating, new level of detail etc but with all these talented freelance designers on Kickstarter at least we'll have evolution either way.

I never considered this before, but it makes sense. With Lee and Jason leaving, that's a considerable talent drain from E's design team. While Madison is a formidable magician and card mechanic, he's not much of a designer once you get past his ubiquitous logo.

Maybe this explains why D$D sucks so much as well. After Si Scott's Smoke & Mirrors v.1-3, everything went downhill after that, with the possible exception of the Fantastique deck. They did stuff with Brad Fulton, but that was more like Fulton's Folly (for those that appreciate the historical reference).

sinjin7 wrote:I never considered this before, but it makes sense. With Lee and Jason leaving, that's a considerable talent drain from E's design team. While Madison is a formidable magician and card mechanic, he's not much of a designer once you get past his ubiquitous logo.

Maybe this explains why D$D sucks so much as well. After Si Scott's Smoke & Mirrors v.1-3, everything went downhill after that, with the possible exception of the Fantastique deck. They did stuff with Brad Fulton, but that was more like Fulton's Folly (for those that appreciate the historical reference).

This makes all the sense in the world. But it also scares a beejesus out of me.. I was really looking forward to the next 3 decks in the Fathom/Ignite series. Not to mention any other new decks! What will become of these big companies...?

vasta41 wrote:

sinjin7 wrote:I never considered this before, but it makes sense. With Lee and Jason leaving, that's a considerable talent drain from E's design team. While Madison is a formidable magician and card mechanic, he's not much of a designer once you get past his ubiquitous logo.

Maybe this explains why D$D sucks so much as well. After Si Scott's Smoke & Mirrors v.1-3, everything went downhill after that, with the possible exception of the Fantastique deck. They did stuff with Brad Fulton, but that was more like Fulton's Folly (for those that appreciate the historical reference).

This makes all the sense in the world. But it also scares a beejesus out of me.. I was really looking forward to the next 3 decks in the Fathom/Ignite series. Not to mention any other new decks! What will become of these big companies...?

I think they'll have to either pay more to get and keep designers, which could in turn cost more for them to produce a deck OR they could keep sourcing and finding young talented designers. I know young designers often time are willing to work for a bit less to do bigger projects and gain more exposure quickly, but than it's more likely that those same young talents will eventually leave once they've established themselves/gain enough exposure to have some worth/credit to their name.

Good talent doesn't come cheap and it shouldn't.

vasta41 wrote: This makes all the sense in the world. But it also scares a beejesus out of me.. I was really looking forward to the next 3 decks in the Fathom/Ignite series. Not to mention any other new decks! What will become of these big companies...?

Not sure they care but they're getting their asses handed to them in the creative department. Not only that, look at the prices the killer KS decks are commanding on eBay. They have to resort to false promises to get anywhere near that for their decks.

I think it's worth noting that the cards designed by people on kickstarter (the good ones anyway) sell for a lot more money than what the 'run of the mill' decks that ellusionist etc pump out.

I think they have to be now looked at 2 separate entities entirely. The decks made & produced by ellusionist, d$d, T11, TBC etc are really just main stream decks for every day use. Granted there are some exceptions to this like the private reserve etc which are made in ltd quantities, therefor have a higher value because of there rarity.

KS decks though like anything from kings wild for example are designed by designers who know there job. These cards have a much heavier emphasis placed on the look of the deck. They command a higher price because in my opinion a lot more work & skill goes into designing them.

They really are chalk and cheese. KS designers like Jackson Robinson really have raised the game in terms of collectable decks. It used to be enough for ellusionist or whoever to make decks more collectable because of a ltd run.

The difference is all in the price you pay. A deck of madison decks on ellusionist will cost, what, $6.50. Backing a project by a decent card designer on KS will normally be around double that cost.

You get what you pay for.

I'm not sticking up for ellusionist or any of the companies that slap decks out each week. Like I say, I don't really see these decks as collectable decks anymore. For that you need to have a ltd run outlined from the start and some pretty fancy design elements now to get any attention.

Ellusionist, d$d etc will be happy pumping these decks into the hands of card players, magicians, flourishers etc that want to get through a brick a month.

Very well put by Wilko, on the money! It does cross over a little, but for the most part these days they're two different target audiences.

... According to his card site - a purple and yellow version are on the way, which is very un-Madison. http://www.madisonplayingcards.com/HustlersYellow.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I understand you point, Wilko, mass production versus limited production. However, playing the devil's advocate here, all decks have to go through the press regardless of the print run. If you're going to print high numbers you enhance the appeal to buyers of putting out a quality design, not just a color changed re-dicked redesign of the same old crap. Basically, if you can sell a bunch of a boring design you should be able to sell a size able peepot of a really good one.